Tag Archives: jet

Rebuilding, Manhattan

Image September 11, 2021 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Cranes atop the new World Trade Center building.

Those who recall the events of 9/11 have a variety of memories of that date and what followed. The subject is too big for me to claim to address it in two paragraphs and a photograph, so I’ll simply recall a few things of my own from that date. Back then it was my habit to get up early, turn on the radio while having breakfast, and listen to news. The first report here on the West Coast lacked much detail but mentioned a plane hitting one of the towers. I immediately thought of older incidents where small planes struck tall buildings, and I assumed it was such a story. But from there began a crescendo of news that got worse and worse over the day and beyond — thousands died and America went to war and the effect still reverberate.

On a visit to New York around New Year’s Day 2000 we had ridden the elevators and climbed the stairs to venture out on the catwalks above one of the towers at night. Among other things, we had watched passing planes from that vantage point. We did not visit New York again until very close to exactly one decade after the attack. Thinking back, we somehow mostly managed to avoid the WTC site until late in the visit when we finally went there. It was an overwhelming experience, though at that point it was a construction site — a place of growth rather than destruction — but the fact of what had happened there could not be ignored. I made the photograph of the new tower under construction from the Brooklyn Bridge.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Sunset Virga

April 11, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Falling virga drifts below sunset clouds of an incoming late-autumn Pacific storm front

First off, the word “virga” refers to streaks or columns of precipitation that fall from clouds but do not make it to the ground. Virga can often create beautiful, delicate, and gossamer atmospheric effects, especially when the light is just right. In this case the condition was back and top-lit by low sunset light flowing upwards toward the base of high clouds from an incoming winter Pacific storm front.

This evening was (yet another) of those on which earlier unpromising conditions exploded with color right at the end of the day. We had spent the morning photographing birds (mostly geese) at a Central Valley wildlife refuge, taken a short lunch break, and then returned to the refuge for late afternoon and evening photography. The geese were wonderful and we made a lot of photographs, but it seemed like the light was going to “die” before sunset as those high clouds began to drift in from the west. That’s OK, as there are ways to photograph in that more subdue light, but I think we may have been mildly disappointed that the clouds appeared to preclude special sunset colors. So we went about our business of photographing birds, not thinking too much about the sky. Speaking for myself, though, at some point I began to notice a bit of color in the clouds behind the birds. I stopped for a moment and looked to the east (where the sunset colors first are seen before the sweep across the sky toward the setting sun) and noticed that some color was developing. In short order, the underside of the clouds began to light up, and right at sunset we were treated to an absolutely brilliant display of intense color to the west. Since I was shooting with a long telephoto I decided to try a few detail shots of small sections of the sky. If you look very carefully, you might be able to spot a jetliner heading into the sunset.

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California Sky, New Years Morning

September 10, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The sky over Northern California, stretching from coastal hills and fog across the tule-fog-filled Central Valley to the Sierra Nevada, New Years Morning.

On New Years Day 2008 I flew to Seattle for a family visit. As we flew out of San Jose and over the hills along the eastern edge of the Bay Area, the winter tule fog was filling the Central Valley and spilling up against the hills, while above and beyond it was a nearly perfectly clear sky. For those who might be unfamiliar with the landscape here, beyond the fog-filled Central Valley, and very far away, the faint dark line of the Sierra Nevada crest is visible, and if you look very closely you may be able to see that the highest peaks are snow-capped.

This photograph has sat in the archive for over three years. I liked the scene but I wasn’t quite sure of what to do with the somewhat odd colors that resulted from shooting though an airplane window and into very bright light. I had considered a straightforward black and white interpretation and, if fact, that is what I was working on when I decided to instead desaturate the image about three-quarters of the way to being monochrome – and for me this seemed like just the right thing and more in line with how I think of the scene now. Another question was whether to clone out the contrail of another plane near the upper left corner. In the end I decided to leave it, for several reasons that I’ll leave to your imagination for now.

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Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Textures, Photographs: Urban/Street

Standard Hotel, Clouds, and Airplane

August 24, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

An airplane crosses a cloud-filled New York City sky above the Standard Hotel at the High Line Park in Chelsea.

This hotel straddling the High Line Elevated Park in New York City presents a striking appearance, especially when the right clouds are reflected in its glass-window surface. We were in the area on a summer evening when the sky was filled with interesting clouds, and by the time we finished walking to and then along the elevated path of the High Line park we had seen it from quite a few angles.

This was my first visit to New York City in a decade, and I have to say that coming to terms with it as a photographic subject is a tall task for someone trying to take in the whole thing for (not quite) the first time. I do a lot of street and urban photography, but usually in places with which I’m familiar – San Francisco is a short train ride from where I live, so I photograph there a lot. For me, it takes some time to get beyond the overwhelming first impressions and settle down and achieve a level of comfort with the place. There were days in New York when, despite being in the midst of tremendous numbers of photographic opportunities, I found it almost impossible to figure out what to shoot. And there were also certain times when “the light came on” and I made a lot of photographs, including this evening.

I need to go back…

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Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.