Tag Archives: leaves

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

Autumn Aspen Grove

June 24, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

An eastern Sierra Nevada aspen grove beginning to change colors

How about a bit of fall color on this early summer morning? Every summer I begin to think about fall. There are wonderful things about summer — schedules, warmth, easier access to mountains, and more — but I prefer autumn. It is partially something as mundane as my preference for cooler temperatures, but it is also that I like times of obvious transition and times when nature has a slightly sharper edge. I’ll enjoy this summer, but I’m sure that every aspen tree I see in the Sierra in the next few months will make me look forward to autumn.

This aspen color vignette is a small scene from a much larger grove that runs up a hillside in the eastern Sierra Nevada. I prefer to photograph it early and late in the day when the surrounding peaks cast shadows across the trees, both softening the light and opening up the shadows a bit. Among the larger grove are many small scenes where straight trunks (not the norm in the Sierra) are visible among the leaves. On this very early October day most of the grove was still green, but the seasonal change was beginning with some of the smaller trees.

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

Conservation/Environment, Photographs: England, Photographs: People, Photographs: Urban/Street

Pedestrian and Cyclist

June 8, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Pedestrian and cyclist on walkway in front of the Tate Modern, London

We were well into our stay in London in the summer of 2016 when we finally got around to going to the Tate Modern, where there was an exhibit of paintings of Georgia O’Keeffe. I think we waited because she is American, we’ve seen shows of her work a lot, and we probably wondered how new the work would be in a London show. Because of our (misguided!) thinking, we ended up here with only a few hours to spend — only to discover that this was the most extensive collection of O’Keeffe’s work that we had seen in one place and that we didn’t have nearly enough time to see it all.

At one point, perhaps while waiting for our turn to enter the exhibit, we stepped out onto a balcony that was open to the landscaped area between the museum and the River Thames, where there were many pedestrians and a few cyclists. If I watch long enough I find that the passers-by sometimes assemble themselves into interesting groupings and patterns, so I indulged myself in a little bit of overhead photography, looking down from my high perch. The walkway took on a striking blue color in the shadow of the building, lit by the gigantic blue light panel of the sky as a walker and a cyclist approached one another.

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

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature

Mules Ears Flower

April 30, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A spring mules ears flower in the early stages of decay.

Someone suggested that this might simply be called “The World’s Saddest Flower.” It also occurred to me that it might be a fine metaphor for certain political events currently transpiring, or possibly for a number of other things. I find a kind of poignant beauty in this flower, still brilliantly colorful but also clearly falling into decay.

I found this flower on a short hike at a place not far from where I live, a spot that I have gone to for perhaps twenty years in spring to find local wildflowers. It is not a place that most would find remarkable — in fact, I was able to hear urban sounds including heavy equipment in the distance — but it is a place that I know well. I knew that I would find certain flowers — blue dicks, larkspur, Chinese lanterns, California poppies, and a few others — but this one was a surprise. I had never seen it or anything similar in this place, and I wasn’t sure of what it might be. Friends who know more about flowers than I do suggested that it is probably mules ears — a very sad specimen at this point!

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Autumn Leaves, Sandstone

April 6, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Autumn leaves lie on the sandstone in a high country creek bed, Zion National Park

Every so often I decide to dig back through my older file archives from previous years, and I almost always discover photographs that I had forgotten, that perhaps didn’t resonate at the time, or were part of batches of images that I someone never quite finished reviewing. This is one of those. It comes from a lengthy autumn trip to various places in Zion with a group of friends back in 2012.

I made this photograph in Zion National Park, but it could have been made in uncounted numbers of places in Utah — it has the basic ingredients: patterned and worn sandstone plus leaves. This scene is as I found it, a small vignette of leaves, some in colors matching those of the sandstone and couple yellow enough to stand out from the background.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: leaves

Autumn Aspen Grove

Pedestrian and Cyclist

Mules Ears Flower

Autumn Leaves, Sandstone

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