Tag Archives: light

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Horsetail Fall, Sunset (#2)

February 22, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 4 Comments

Horsetail Fall in the final sunset light on a mid-February evening, Yosemite Valley, California.

I was in Yosemite Valley for a couple of days during the middle of February. My main reason for going was not to photograph the seasonal and iconic sunset light on Horsetail Fall, but it turned out that I did just that – twice. Since I have photographed the phenomenon in the past and already have a photograph that I consider a success, shooting it again isn’t at the top of my to-do list. However, I’ll shoot an icon if I think that the conditions might be special. In the afternoon I had been up high enough to get a clear view to the west, and it had looked almost completely clear. This is pretty much a necessary condition for good light on Horsetail, since the very late and low-angle light has to come in from across the Central Valley unobstructed. And, as everyone knows by now, the fall is an intermittent and seasonal event that depends on the right combination of prior snow (or rain) and warm weather to get the creek feeding the fall running in the middle of winter. It turned out that this had also happened, and the fall was running pretty strongly.

So, with all of those pieces apparently in play I decided to head on over to the picnic area beneath El Cap and then wander east until I found a suitable viewpoint. Still a bit ambivalent about shooting Horsetail, one reason I chose this spot is that it allowed me to shoot other subjects in the late afternoon and then arrive more or less at the last moment (around 5:00 p.m.) and still find parking and a spot to shoot. The parking, especially, can be more problematic at the other popular location, located along Southside Drive.

In the end, it was an odd evening for Horsetail. As the sunset continued the fall began to glow, and it looked like it might possibly turn out to be a really special night to shoot this subject. But then a few minutes before the peak of color would have occurred… it was as if someone switched the lights off. Very quickly the color dimmed to much more muted shades and remained so as the light faded. This was my last shot before that turn of events occurred, and this color corrected version (compensating for the otherwise very blue light on the rock face not struck by the sunlight) picked up some nice light and some of the most delicate and beautiful spray I’ve seen on the fall.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

keywords: yosemite, national, park, valley, california, usa, north america, nature, winter, landscape, cliff, water, fall, waterfall, creek, el capitan, ledge, crack, tree, skyline, ridge, buttress, mist, spray, horsetail, fire, evening, sunset, light, travel, scenic, mountain, sierra, nevada, range, winter, february, shadow, stock

Photographs: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Brick and Concrete Buildings, Mare Island

February 21, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Night photography of brick and concrete buildings under artificial lighting with star trails at the Mare Island Naval Shipyard, Vallejo, California.

The Mare Island night photography well has still not quite run dry – so here is one more from my February 6 shoot there with The Nocturnes. I spent a fair amount of time poking around the spaces near this brilliantly lit concrete building and the darker brick building beyond, photographing the two buildings from various angles and directions. The contrast between the artificially lit plain concrete walls of the foreground building and the darker and more textured brick walls of the further building was striking, and I’ve been intrigued for some time by the reflections and glow of the windows up high on the roof. This exposure was long enough that the high clouds moved and created the linear blurred shapes you see in the sky, interspersed with subtle but numerous star trails.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

keywords: mare, island, naval, ship, yard, historic, vallejo, california, usa, nocturnes, night, photography, structures, minsy, concrete, brick, building, wall, window, light, reflection, shadow, fence, roof, sky, cloud, star, trail, yellow, vent, architecture, asphalt, puddle, industrial, stock, north america

Photographs: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Building 417, Green Shadows and Red Sky

February 17, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Dilapidated Building 417 under garish green light and reddish sky, Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, Vallejo, California.

I think this photograph probably includes some of the most bizarre lighting that I’ve encountered at Mare Island when doing night photography there. The majority of the light comes from the right, from artificial light that has been roughly color corrected to appear relatively white, at least by comparison to some of the other light colors in this image. The garish green color comes from some add artificial light behind my camera position – the same light that appears in a recently posted photograph of Building 631 with it terribly peeling wooden walls. (One odd touch – note that the shadow of the tree that appears near the center of the lower part of the building is illuminated by this light, explaining the green tree.) The green tones also appear in the stripe of paint along the upper edge of the old loading dock, in the small #417 sign at the peak of the building, and in the less-dark portions of the tree at upper right. Then the sky ends up with odd reddish-brown light reflected on the bottoms of the moving clouds, and a similar tone is found on the wall pattern of the building in the background on the left side of the frame. Finally, though it is hard to see in this small image, there is a bit of sort of grayish-purple in the window frame at the right border of the frame.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

keywords: mare, island, naval, ship, yard, historic, vallejo, california, usa, nocturnes, night, photography, structures, red, green, garish, artificial, light, sidewalk, street, lines, cement, wall, loading, dock, corrugated, building, 417, angles, architecture, windows, door, wall, tree, urban, north america, roof, sign, stock, minsy

Photographs: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Building 631, Mare Island

February 16, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 6 Comments

Building 631, with badly peeling paint and illuminated by garish artificial lighting, Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, Vallejo, California.

For some reason I often find myself down around the old power plant and in the alley next to Building 631 near the end of my nighttime shoots at Mare Island. The railroad tracks curve through this alley – though they aren’t particularly visible in this photograph – and the bizarre and garish light and grossly peeling paint on this wall seem different from many of the other subjects around here.

One of the fun things about this sort of night photography is that “white balance” is more or less impossible! This scene includes light sources ranging from some kind of bizarre blue-green lighting that I can’t identify (fluorescent?) to sodium vapor to tungsten to sky lit by the glow from Vallejo, across the bay from the island. When it comes to the right color balance… pick one! Or several! Or make one up! In the end, no matter what you choose it won’t really “look like” what you saw in the dead of night – but for me that isn’t really the object. Long-exposure night photography lets us reveal things that we cannot see with our own eyes and present them in ways that are imaginative and different from our usual reality.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

keywords: mare, island, naval, ship, yard, historic, vallejo, california, usa, nocturnes, night, photography, structures, building, 631, peeling, paint, wall, door, light, lamp, garish, artificial, window, road, track, sky, plants, old, abandoned, industrial, north america, conduit, boarded up, downspout, no parking, wire, perspective, convergence, stock

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