Tag Archives: monochrome

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Headlands, Surf, Natural Bridge

Image January 7, 2019 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Storm surf raises spray among rocky headlands along the Big Sur coast

This is a scene that is very familiar to me at this point, though it is never exactly the same twice. Even when I try to resist the urge to rephotograph the familiar scene, I almost always end up stopping at least briefly. One reason is that I recall fondly the serendipitous story of the first time I photographed there. I had gone somewhere else initially, but it was too early for that location so I decided to go somewhere else before returning. I made a more or less random decision to head south — I think that a right turn was easier than a left — and headed down the coast to discover, to my surprise, that the surf was raising a cloud of spray along the shoreline. I happened to stop at this spot and I happened to have a new lens, without which the particular photograph would not have been possible.

Above, a mentioned that this location is never the same twice. I’ve been there in every season, during storms and fog and clearly, sunlit days. On the occasion when I made the photograph seen here it was rather nice weather, but the sea was angry, with swells of up to forty feet rolling onto the rocks and headlands, raising fog of ocean spray that was backlit by the low angle, late-autumn sun. I timed this exposure to be just after a big set of waves, and while the surf had calmed a bit the spray still filled the air.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

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Photographs: Structures and Objects

Celebrate 75 Years

Image January 6, 2019 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

This photograph could be seen as a lesson and as an example regarding practice… and in a few other ways, as well. I don’t know if much needs to be said about it, but I’ll offer a few thoughts anyway. I made it while I was busy doing what might seem more like “work” photography — documenting the opening reception of an exhibit by my friend Oliver Klink, whose beautiful “Cultures in Transition” exhibit had recently been installed at PhotoCentral in Hayward, California. Mostly I was running around making photographs of various people attending the event and photographs of the gallery space. But every so often I spot something that seems like a photograph in its own right, and I disconnect from the work momentarily to capture that “something.”

This is, admittedly, a somewhat minimal and perhaps even somewhat enigmatic photograph — and it also doesn’t likely seem all that connected to the landscape photography of mine that may be more familiar. There are several ways one could “read” this image, but rather than being didactic about it, I’ll leave the reading to the viewer. What do you see?

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G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others.

Photographs: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects

Ship Yard Crane Structure, Night

Image January 4, 2019 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The historic Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, on an island across the narrow bay from Vallejo, California, is a remarkable place. It has a long history, going back to the first half of the 1800s, when it was the first such ship yard on the west coast of the United States. It continued to serve in that capacity until the 1990s, when it was finally decommissioned. At first, much of the facility languished, gradually falling into disrepair. More recently, it has become the site of redevelopment, new construction… and efforts to arrest the decay and preserve some of the historic area.

Mare Island has also been a Mecca for Bay Area night photographers for a couple of decades. Ask almost any area night photographer if they’ve been there, and the answer will be “yes.” I got my start doing night photography at Mare Island about fifteen years ago, when I happened to end up at an introductory session run by the original “The Nocturnes” group, put on as part of the Pacific Flyway Festival. The subject of this photograph is one of the gigantic shipyard crane structures found along the waterfront, designed to facilitate moving huge ship components at the dry-docks. This crane sits on carriages that run on a short section of curving track, allowing it to move over a short distance.

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Photographs: England, Photographs: People, Photographs: Travel, Photographs: Urban/Street

At the MillenNium Bridge

Image December 27, 2018 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

People, clouds, and sky, London

We have been to London a few times in recent years, and our latest visit was this past summer, when we spent just a few days there near the start of our long travels through portions of Northern Europe. We “staged” our transit, starting with a three-hour time change and a few days in New York, followed by the six-hour time change between there and London, and then a few days to adapt in London before heading on to the next place.

The visit was short, so we didn’t schedule a lot of specific events, aside from one of the “Proms” concerts. This left us with time to wander. As always happens at some point, we ended up crossing this bridge. On the south side, near the Tate Modern, the bridge sort of splits into two halves, with a descending ramp heading back between the two sections as it drops toward the walkway along the River Thames. On an early visit I become intrigued with this as a spot to photograph the bridge, the city, and the people passing by. As we dropped down that center ramp I looked up and saw this fellow “posing” against a striking sky.