Tag Archives: lake

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Autumn Flurries, Morning

October 26, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

An early autumn weather front drops morning snow flurries along the rugged Sierra Nevada crest near Mount Morrison

This is another photograph from the final morning of our September photographic trip to the eastern Sierra Nevada. We were surprised to find it snowing lightly when we work up in Mammoth that morning, since there had been no mention of such weather in the previous day’s forecast. We decided to stick with our plan of making a big loop out to the east of Mammoth Lakes and then north by a back route to Mono Lake and highway 395 for our return trip. So we headed down the road out of Mammoth Lakes in the pre-dawn near-darkness and then started out across Long Valley.

Out in the valley as dawn approached, it became clear that the atmosphere was doing some very interesting things along the eastern edge of the Sierra. At first we saw a very strong weather cell over Mammoth Lakes that appeared to be dropping quite a bit of rain or snow, even though where we were it was virtually clear overhead. So we stopped and set up to make some photographs of these conditions. We continued shooting after the first red dawn light and watched as the snow squall worked its way south along the Sierra crest. In this photograph there is light snow falling along the ridge near Mount Morrison, but since the clouds did not extend to the east, the early morning light is hitting the upper slopes of this line of peaks.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Shoreline, Morning

October 24, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The shoreline of an unnamed sub-alpine lake in the Kings Canyon National Park High Sierra.

I made this photograph along the shoreline of one of the many small lakes lying within a very short walk from our back-country campsite high in the eastern Sierra near the crest in Kings Canyon National Park. On this morning I headed up canyon with vague ideas about looking for back-light, a favorite condition/subject of mine in the Sierra. I first wandered up one side of the canyon and after finishing my slow amble at a main lake I reversed my track and headed back down the other side of the narrow valley, passing this small lake.

At just about this time the sun cleared the higher ridge to our east and its morning light arrived at the shoreline. The back-light creates a fringe of light in the outer needles of the trees and it illuminates the willows and other smaller plants that were beginning to take on autumn colors. Here the clear water near the edge of the lake was very shallow, and the patterns of the submerged shoreline rocks continues the rocky character of the shoreline. In typical high Sierra fashion, there is rock everywhere, with much of the vegetation working hard to find sustenance in rocky soil between the granite outcroppings and slabs.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Aspen Leaves on Snow

October 17, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Frost covered autumn aspen leaves lying on new-fallen snow, Sierra Nevada

Early October is the time of the annual aspen color transition in the eastern Sierra Nevada. For me, the combination of the dramatic color change and the seasonal weather changes clearly denote the fact that summer is over and that we are heading toward the cold part of the year. (I like this – I find that the fall through spring seasons are more photographically compelling, and I’m no longer a “hot weather person.”) While October in the Sierra can bring some beautiful and even warm days, there is not question that nights are both longer and colder, and the occasional passing weather front will drop enough snow to make it feel distinctly winter-like.

Although we knew that much of the iconic color at North Lake had already passed, we decided to go there anyway on this morning and look for more subtle things that remain. The road past the lake is on a north slope and we drove through plenty of recent snow as we passed along this shoreline in 22 degree temperatures. As expected, most of the trees had lost their leaves already, though we also found some trees that still held enough colorful leaves to make the visit well worth our time. And, when those leaves fall, they don’t simply disappear! On a snowy morning like this one they collect in piles on top of the snow, providing beautiful little compositions and highlighting the intensity of their colors.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Shoreline Meadow, Unnamed Lake

October 16, 2013 G Dan Mitchell 3 Comments

Granite boulders line a small rock-filled meadow near the outlet of an unnamed sub-alpine High Sierra lake, Kings Canyon National Park

This is, to say the least, a complex photograph. I am well aware that it violates all of the “rules,” especially those that suggest that a photograph should have a clear central subject. While that is often fine advice – and I often try to use a single aspect of a larger subject to say something about the larger whole – I think that in some cases it may be fine to use a photograph to portray things that are not quite so simple, and subjects or scenes where the core nature of the thing is, in fact, its overwhelming complexity of detail and form.

This was clearly a very detailed scene, and it embodies an important aspect of the character of these high sierra areas that sit just below timberline in the sub-alpine zone. While there is an order to this environment, it is not a simple order and many components work together in complex ways. I made this photograph at the outlet stream of this nameless lake, located at the 11,000′ level a very short distance from our camp. On this morning the lake’s waters were very still, reflecting the rocky surrounding terrain. (The only simple thing in this scene is the bit of reflected sky at the lower right.) The bit of foreground meadow has taken on the late summer and early fall golden and brown tones, and its surface is interrupted by embedded rocks that become more numerous near the lake’s edge and in its outlet stream. The rest of the landscape is largely one of rock – massive chunks of rock such as the dome-like feature along the far shore and the rounded and rugged shapes of the slopes above, along with fractured and shattered talus slopes composed of rock that has fallen down from the peaks above. Aside from the meadow, the only plant life visible in this landscape consists of scattered trees growing among the rocks and small clusters of alpine willows.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: lake

Autumn Flurries, Morning

Shoreline, Morning

Aspen Leaves on Snow

Shoreline Meadow, Unnamed Lake

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