Tag Archives: landscape

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Lake, Trees, Storm

October 26, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Evening at a subalpine lake on a day of late-season storms

This weeklong photography trip into the Yosemite backcountry this September brought some very strange atmospheric conditions. To begin with, the four-year California drought has deeply affected the Sierra, and by the time we got into the mountains there were wildfires up and down the range. One significant fire was burning no far away inside the park, another large fire burned just outside the park to the north, and a small lightning-caused “management fire” was burning very close to our camp. At least once per day we were inundated with thick wildfire smoke, morning or evening. (We counted ourselves lucky to get a good half day of photography conditions each day.)

Closer to the end of the trip we encountered another weather anomaly. Thunderstorms are not unusual this time of year, and it is even possible to get an early Gulf of Alaska Pacific storm. But instead we got the remnants of the hurricane off of Mexico. When all was said and done we had virtually two days of rain — not the terrible rain that keeps you in at the tent, but the general light rain that eventually gets everything wet, but which also produces some very wonderful effects of atmosphere and light. This evening exemplified such conditions. Beyond the forest ringing out lake the sky included dark clouds and lighter areas where a bit more light made it through, and all of this was mirrored in the calm surface of the lake.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Home Away From Home

October 25, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

My camp for a week in the Yosemite backcountry, September 2015

For the past few years I have escaped to the mountains (or desert, in one case) each fall or late summer for uninterrupted photography. Perhaps a half-dozen years ago I was fortunate enough to be able to join up with the five photographers whose work appears in the book “First Light: Five Photographers Explore Yosemite’s Wilderness.” The first year I more or less ran into the group (Charles Cramer, Scot Miller, Mike Osborne, Keith Walklet, Karl Kroeber) — they were on a pack-train supported weeklong-plus trip, and had backpacked in to the same area where I ran into them briefly. The next year I “crashed” their lengthy back-country trip for a few days; the following year I was still a backpacker (they used pack animals) but I joined them for the better part of a week. Since that time I’ve joined all or part of the group for a week or more each fall. (I’m grateful to all of them for welcoming me to join them.)

This year a smaller group of us spent a bit more than a week camped at a single Yosemite backcountry location. For someone with years of backpacking experience, typically moving from place to place each day, staying in one spot for so long has been a revelation. At first I wondered how in the world there will be enough to keep me busy for a week or more. Then half way through the trip I typically realize that I have just enough time to photograph the things I decide are important to work on, only to discover on the final day or two that I could probably actually use another half week or more! The photograph shows my backcountry home for a week this past September, at the end of a granite slab that extended almost all the way to the lake that was our home base.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: People, Photographs: Photographers

Photographer, Long Valley, Dawn

October 24, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Photographer Patricia Emerson Mitchell working the dawn light near a small lake in Long Valley

On about my third week of aspen photography this fall I was accompanied back to the Sierra by my wife and fellow photographer, Patricia Emerson Mitchell. There are all sorts of advantages for me when she comes along — motel (instead of tent or back of car), real food (instead of things heated over a camp stove), and more… ;-) By this point in the aspen season I was ready for something that wasn’t aspen, so on this morning we headed east rather than west into the Sierra, traveling out across Long Valley with a plan of going even further east toward the White Mountains near the town of Benton.

We started in near darkness and arrived at a familiar spot out in the Valley before the sun rose. We parked and headed out to our destination, arriving a few minutes before the light, at which point we went to work rapidly — the photographic opportunities evolve rapidly as the first light arrives. Here she sets up close to the shoreline of the lack, photographing across the water toward mountains to our north as the first light rakes across sagebrush and the nearby hills.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Grove of Small Aspens

October 23, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A dense autumn grove of small eastern Sierra Nevada aspen trees with bare trunks

This little grove, and this specific spot in this grove has become a sort of old friend. It is one of those odd little spots that most people would probably miss, and with good reason. The trees are small, they are on the far side of a creek, access is via a short and unmarked little one-lane gravel road, and the trees are in many ways unremarkable, especially in a place and at a time when there are many larger and more spectacular groves nearby.

I first came here by accident some years back, turning into a nearly hidden side road on a whim and then randomly exploring its short length. Part way along there is a wide spot, and I happened to pull off there, get out and look around. The small and very dense trees got my attention, and I discovered that they grow so closely that it is difficult to pass among them. (This year I thought I’d walk through the grove to see what is on the other side — I have up about thirty feet in!) But such a grove, with so many little trees, offers an astounding range of arrangements of trees. I can photograph up close with a wide-angle lens; I can step back and narrow the frame with a long lens, I can move in among the trees, I can visit when the trees are full of colorful leaves or almost bare. In any case, every time I pass by here, without fail, I take the little side road and stop quietly here for a few minutes.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: landscape

Lake, Trees, Storm

Home Away From Home

Photographer, Long Valley, Dawn

Grove of Small Aspens

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