Tag Archives: light

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Badlands, Morning

April 8, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning light on rugged badlands, Death Valley National Park

This was a different sort of Death Valley visit than usual. My typical visit takes a pretty uncivilized approach. I always camp, sometimes in the back of my vehicle so that I can be in the right places quickly. I virtually always work completely alone, aside from occasionally running into another photographer or two. With the exception of a restaurant meal or two, I typically eat one backpacker-style hot meal in the evening, usually after returning from an evening shoot after dark, and the rest of the time I “browse” on whatever I can have with me. To a non-photographer that may sound somewhat rough, but photographers understand that this keeps me mobile, “out there” in the field, and gets me to places I might not see and experiences I might not have otherwise. I’m fine with it!

But this time, my wife came along. Aside from the expected changes this brings—she isn’t a camper, so we stayed at Stovepipe Wells—it also presents the opportunity to see the area through a different set of eyes and to revisit some of the more familiar places that I might otherwise not photograph. In the “different set of eyes department,” she is an avid photographer of very small things, mostly wildflowers. A few years ago she began to come along on a few of my shoots and then to carry a camera. While I would be off photographing some Big Thing, she would be crouched down in the brush somewhere finding an amazing flower that I hadn’t even realized was there. (A bit later I’ll post a few wildflower photographs from this trip, including many photographs of flowers I would likely have overlooked if she had not been along for the ride.) In addition, since she had never been to Death Valley before, it was important to hit some of the iconic locations in addition to heading out to some of the less visited places that I know about. With this in mind, I planned a morning at Zabriskie Point. Zabriskie is, to borrow a phrase, an icon for a reason. Since I’ve photographed extensively in the park for a decade now, I don’t usually photograph there unless I expect something truly exceptional or unusual. But, let’s be honest, a new visitor to DEVA must experience a sunrise at Zabriskie, which is just what we did on this morning. This did give me an opportunity to engage in a little informal project that I’ve been playing with for a few years, one that has me pointing my camera away from the familiar grand view over Gower Gulch and Manley Beacon toward the Valley and the Panamint Mountains and toward some of the other geological features found here.

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Commentary, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco

Dawn, San Francisco Bay

April 6, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Dawn light, fog, and high clouds over the northern shoreline of San Francisco Bay

This early morning late-winter view of San Francisco Bay looks back to the east from the Marin Headlands. The morning had started with somewhat murky conditions—high clouds above, atmospheric haze over the bay, and for along the San Francisco waterfront and across the bay toward Oakland. I was hoping for color, but the moment of sunrise was a bit disappointing in that regard. The probably was some color, but it was muted by the high clouds and haze and it happened mostly behind that fog bank floating above the East Bay.

But soon the high clouds began to pick up some color, and this pinkish glow reflected down towards the water, the fog, and the haze, gently coloring the scene. I thought that I might break up the many horizontal layers of light and color by including a it of the foreground land, and I experimented with several compositions: one that centered Angel Island in the scene, one that caught a bit of the edge of Angel Island and a bit of the Tiburon shoreline, and then this one which just included a bit of the north bay shoreline instead. Having watched so many sunrises, I still am struck by how this visual beauty arrives without a sound.

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

Fog, Tree, Marsh, Morning Sky

April 5, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Winter morning fog in bright morning light above a San Joaquin Valley marsh

I made this photograph, rendered here as a high key black and white image, in a wetland area of California’s San Joaquin Valley. Photography began on this morning before dawn, in very foggy conditions. Here, nearly two hours later, we had worked our way around to a different location where shallow ponds stretched into the distance, reflecting trees in the thinning fog that was brightly lit by the morning sun, and with high clouds above.

At the time when I looked across this water I was struck by how little of substance there was in the scene. Above was misty and faintly blue sky with thin clouds. Below there was water, but the water served primary to reflect that same sky. The only solid material in the scene is the faint trees, a few birds, some bits of grass, and a couple of thin strips of levee. Everything else is sky or fog or reflection of sky and fog. The photograph is one of a series that I have tucked away, yet to work on at the appropriate time, and in need of further thought: Do I work with the high key luminosity of the scene, or do I work with the color version in which everything is shades of blue?

Photographs: San Francisco

North Tower, Dawn Fog

April 4, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

There are many associations with this location and scenes like this, at least for me. I am fascinated by the shapes, colors, and textures of this bridge, a structure that we take for granted here in the Bay Area. The location from which I photographed is also familiar and easily taken for granted, yet it is a spectacular place, sitting high above the bridge, the Golden Gate itself, the Pacific Ocean, and the San Francisco Bay spreading inland to the west. At this early morning hour, while the sound of traffic approaching the bridge is faintly audible far below, it is otherwise nearly silent. It is also typically cool and damp, most often with at least some fog around—occasionally so much that the view is completely blocked. The City is visible across the Bay, seeming like it is coming back to life at this early hour, with cars heading in to work and lights from the fading night still turned on.

The dawn light on this morning was, as usual, not exacty like any previous morning that I’ve seen here. When I left home well before dawn I thought that it might be clear over the entrance to the Bay, but as I got closer I encountered fog on the San Francisco side. But as I crossed the bridge, and a bit to my surprise, it was clear over the water—the fog seemed to be mostly over the south shore. There were high, thin clouds above the fog and the light haze. At first it looked like all of this cloudiness would kill any morning color, and that impression was strengthened as the sun came up behind the clouds to the east with only the subtlest color. But a bit later, some minutes after actual dawn, the rising sun’s colorful light began to clear that eastern fog and slant across the top of the thinning fog bank to my south.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: light

Badlands, Morning

Dawn, San Francisco Bay

Fog, Tree, Marsh, Morning Sky

North Tower, Dawn Fog

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