Tag Archives: morning

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Third Street Bridge, Morning

April 8, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The Third Street Bridge near AT&T Park in San Francisco, California.

This bridges sits in a newly revitalized area of San Francisco next to the Giants’ AT&T ball park, which is visible in the background along the right side of the frame. In an area that was (and still is, if you look around a bit) somewhat “seedy,” there are now, for better or for worse, lots of new buildings including businesses and condominiums. This bridge seems like a sort of surprising structure to see in a place like this. It is a “draw bridge” that can apparently be lifted to allow boats to pass underneath to go in and out of a small inlet that extends from the bay (to the right of this photo) and inland a ways.

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

Forest, Morning Light

April 6, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning light shines into forest at the top of bluffs above the Pacific Ocean, Point Lobos State Reserve.

These forests at Point Lobos are often very appealing places to be, but I find them to be difficult to photograph! They are full of light in the right conditions – while the trees can grow somewhat close together, they tend to form a relatively open canopy that lets the light in. There is often moss hanging down from branches. Various plants grow along the ground – though watch out for the poison oak! And, of course, when you are actually there the constant sound of the surf is never far away, the air is cool, and there is often at least some breeze.

But some of these same attractive features are the source of (for me, anyway) the challenges of photographing these forests. The light, as beautiful as it is, can be very tricky. Because of the thin canopy of the trees, the direct sunlight often makes it down into the lower reaches of the forest and hits trunks and branches, creating spots of very bright light that are hard to manage. I could photograph (and have done so) in overcast or foggy conditions… but there goes that light. And the dense growth makes it difficult to find compositions that show the larger forest itself rather than just isolated elements of it. But on this visit high, thin clouds came to the rescue. While they were thin enough to allow directional sun light into the forest, they were just opaque enough to take the harsh edge off of the light.

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

Pine Cones and Ice, Reflected Sky

March 28, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Pine cones on morning ice, blue with reflected light from the sky, Yosemite National Park.

I’m on a bit of a minor Yosemite run right now, as I’ve found a bit of extra time to get back to my review of the past ten year’s of image files. I had almost completed the task earlier this year, but the work stalled out a few months back somewhere in the spring of 2011. I’m now up to June of that year and hoping to continue the slog!

I made this photograph right about the time that Tioga Pass first opened for the season – not the first day, but very close to it. I had gotten up very early that morning to photograph in the pre-dawn cold near Tioga Pass, and from there began to work my way back to the west towards Tuolumne Meadows. I stopped at a small roadside lake to photograph a larger scene and as I was setting up for that shot I looked down and noticed the newly formed ice with its fractured texture reflecting the morning’s blue sky and supporting a variety of things that had blown down including a couple of pine cones. If you look carefully you can just make out rocks and grasses beneath the ice.

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco

Morning Clouds, Angel Island, San Francisco Bay

March 13, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Light shining through layers of morning clouds over San Francisco Bay silhouettes the hills of Angel Island near Richardson Bay.

I can be a bit of a creature of habit when it comes to shooting in certain locations that I’m very familiar with. But the habit isn’t so much shooting the same thing – though that can be part of it – as it is being attentive to how the familiar thing might present itself in ways I have not previously seen. This photograph is a case in point.

I was on my way to a location north of the Golden Gate where I frequently photograph, so I know the route well and have a routine that I frequently follow – it involves where I’m heading, what time I plan to get there, and the route I typically follow. Along the way there are several places where I almost always pause long enough to look around and see if a familiar scene might look different. At a location where my route follows a short ridge line, I often stop and look back across Richardson Bay towards Angel Island and, beyond that, the waterfront of Oakland and then the East Bay hills. On this recent morning, a weak weather front was washing out as it arrived in the Bay Area and, as a result, there were many layers of clouds stacked up to the east. While the sun was able to shine through and light the surface of San Francisco Bay beyond the boats anchored in Richardson Bay, there was haze in the atmosphere that obscured details even on relatively close Angel Island, and in the sky above and beyond there were layers of fog, lower clouds, and the highest clouds of the weather front.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: morning

Third Street Bridge, Morning

Forest, Morning Light

Pine Cones and Ice, Reflected Sky

Morning Clouds, Angel Island, San Francisco Bay

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