Tag Archives: morning

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

Towers, Morning Light

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Towers, Morning Light - Morning light silhouettes towers and ridges, Arches National Park, Utah
Morning light silhouettes towers and ridges, Arches National Park, Utah

Towers, Morning Light. Arches National Park, Utah. April 6, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Morning light silhouettes towers and ridges, Arches National Park, Utah.

On my last morning at Arches National Park in early April, I made one final quick trip back up into the park before hitting the road back to California. I was up very early, arriving in the park before sunrise. I had a string of possible subjects in mind, all of which depended to some extent on how the morning light played out. They include the possibility of photographing the setting full moon against some arch or tower that I might be able to put in the right spot relative to the moon, a strong intention to photograph the Tower of Babel and The Organ in very early light, balanced against a desire to shoot some other arch or tower in similar light, the thought that there might be some chances to shoot details of the Park Avenue area a bit later, and as always the potential to shoot straight into the morning sun and haze – a favorite habit of mine.

After getting to a couple of these subjects, the series of receding ridges, buttes, and towers to the east seemed interesting. I used a long lens to photograph this in order to edit down the portion of the landscape that I would work with and to compress the distances. The scene was trickier than it might appear – because I was using the long lens I had very limited options to move from side to side and still keep an interesting composition. In addition it was windy – always a tricky thing when working with very long focal lengths. And, of course, I was shooting in to the light and the backlit atmospheric haze of the early morning – not that I’m complaining about that, since it is some of my favorite light. In the end, I came up with this composition which includes a bunch of features that I can’t even identify! ;-)

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Sports

Sail Boat, San Francisco Bay

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Sail Boat, San Francisco Bay - A sailboat in morning light on the San Francisco Bay, San Francisco, California.
A sailboat in morning light on the San Francisco Bay, San Francisco, California.

Sail Boat, San Francisco Bay. San Francisco, California. April 20, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A sailboat in morning light on the San Francisco Bay, San Francisco, California.

Taking a momentary break from the continuing stream of photographs from Utah, here is a photograph from San Francisco. On one of the first spring-warm days of the year, I took the train to San Francisco very early and then spent the morning wandering around with my camera and a few lenses. In many ways, this is my preferred approach to shooting in San Francisco – to travel light and walk – since there so many instantaneous and surprising subjects that come and go so quickly. This is sort of my own brand of “Photo Walk” for one.

On this morning I got of the train just after sun rise and first wandered through the China Basin area, taking time to photograph a large construction site before heading back over toward the Embarcadero to walk along the waterfront. As I walked past AT&T Park, I noticed the bright backlit and slightly hazy sky over the Bay and began to look for ways to photograph it. A moment later I found a gap in the shoreline “stuff” where I could get a clear shot of the water, and I stopped to put a longer lens on the camera. Right at that moment – lucky me! – I noticed this solitary sailboat coming into the scene from the right and by working quickly I had time to get about a half dozen shots of it against the minimalist backdrop of the bay before another boat joined it and cluttered up the image.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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

The Organ and The Tower of Babel

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The Organ and the Tower of Babel - The Organ and Courthouse Towers in early morning light, Arches National Park, Utah.
The Organ and The Tower of Babel in early morning light, Arches National Park, Utah.

The Organ and the Tower of Babel. Arches National Park, Utah. April 6, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The Organ and The Tower of Babel in early morning light, Arches National Park, Utah.

We had arrived in Moab, Utah the previous afternoon, and a quick reconnaissance into the Arches National Park in the early evening had impressed me quite a bit, to say the least! This was my first visit to Arches, and I had only a very general idea of what I might see, so coming upon the fantastic sandstone formations – towers, walls, fins, arches, and more – for the first time was a powerful experience. That evening I had a short time to photograph in conditions that were mixed – very nice light but tremendously strong winds that challenged my ability to use a long lens to pick out small sections of the landscape… and my ability to stay warm! In any case, the brief initial visit was enough to give me some ideas of what I might want to photograph early the next morning.

I was up early and into the park before sunrise the next day. Once again, it was cold – colder, actually – and very windy. I’m often fond of photographing big landscapes with long lenses that let me isolate elements from the larger scene and compress the distances, and I wanted to use that approach with some of the formations close to the “Park Avenue” and Courthouse Towers area of the park. With this in mind I stopped a an exposed spot that gave me a view of a number of these features, put on the long lens, set up the tripod… and then struggled with the tremendously windy conditions as the very beautiful light appeared. It was do-able, but not easy. This photograph includes the very early morning light on the faces of The Organ and the Tower of Babel, two huge sandstone fin-like sandstone towers, with high desert, a thin row of cottonwood trees, and more gigantic sandstone cliffs beyond.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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

The Watchman and the Virgin River, Morning

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The Watchman and the Virgin River, Morning - The virgin River curves towards the Watchman in early morning light, Zion National Park, Utah.
The virgin River curves towards the Watchman in early morning light, Zion National Park, Utah.

The Watchman and the Virgin River, Morning. Zion National Park, Utah. April 4, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The virgin River curves towards the Watchman in early morning light, Zion National Park, Utah.

The peak in the upper portion of this photograph, The Watchman, with the curve of the Virgin River in the foreground is, as I understand it, one of the iconic photographic subjects of Zion National Park – perhaps being roughly equivalent to a photograph of Yosemite’s Half Dome from the Sentinel Bridge in The Valley. The funny thing, though, is that while I had seen this view of this subject many times in the photographs of others, I actually had no idea where it was or that I would see it when I visited Zion National Park earlier this month. I had somewhat intentionally avoided doing any real research about the places I would photograph, preferring instead to just confront them for what they are, unaffected as much as possible by previous notions about what I “should” photograph.

So, as we rode the shuttle bus into the park from the town of Springdale in the afternoon and crossed a bridge over the Virgin River before heading up into the canyon, I looked to my right and thought, “Oh, it is that view!” I have heard the stories and have seen the pictures of hordes of photographers lined up on this bridge, specifically to shoot this scene with fall colors and at sunset. (You can see a couple of examples by photographer and friend Gary Crabbe here.) I generally don’t seek out the icons, though I most certainly will photograph them if a) I haven’t photographed them before and/or b) there is something unusual or different about the conditions when I’m there. Although I did not stop and get off the bus to photograph the scene on that first evening, in the back of my mind I considered stopping if it looked interesting the next morning. And, in fact, as we took the shuttle back into the park very early the next morning – starting before sunrise, actually – it seemed like it might be worth hopping off after the bridge and taking a look. I was more encourage when we got there, both by the interesting soft dawn light and the lack of any other photographers on the bridge. So, there you go – I now have a photograph of the Watchman and the Virgin River, too! :-)

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.