Tag Archives: morning

Photographs: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Redwood Grove Panorama

May 12, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A wide panoramic view of morning light in a dense redwood grove at Muir Woods National Monument, California.

Up next in the stitched panorama parade… a photograph make in the vicinity of Bohemian Grove at Muir Woods National Monument in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, California. This grove is high on the list of popular places in the central and well-known section of the park, and the loop trail that many visitors hike travels right through it.

There are, it seems to me, a huge number of ways to photograph these very tall trees. Interesting effects of light filtering down from above are often a possibility. There are lots of small subjects that can be shot close up. But their sheer height is often difficult to capture. You can shoot straight up, but that creates some issues. You can (and I have) shoot in vertical format to try to include the vertical size. You can try to shoot from further back, but then the scale of the trees diminishes – plus it is very hard to get a clear line of site on these trees from any distance… unless, perhaps, you are at the edge of an area that has been logged.

So, I’ve been thinking about shooting very wide panoramas of groves of parallel vertical forms of the massive trunks. I think that this has two effects that work for me. First, when you stand before these trees and look around you mostly are seeing just the lower sections of the trees – so for me this depiction is true to the experience of being in the forest. Second, the fact that you cannot see the full height of the trees doesn’t mean that you aren’t aware of it! Focusing on these massive trunks might cause you to project the rest of the trees and the great height that isn’t included within the frame. (This isn’t the first time I’ve done this, and I’m certainly not the first person to do it.)

By the way, because the image is stitched from multiple high-resolution full-frame images, it has the potential to be printed very large at some point.

(More of my Muir Woods photographs)

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.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4 L USM at 200mm
ISO 200, f/116, .6 second
panorama stitched from multiple exposures

keywords: morning, light, tree, forest, grove, trunk, tall, giant, coast, sempervirens, redwood, muir, woods, national, monument, golden gate, recreation, area, landscape, nature, scenic, travel, san francisco, california, usa, north america, stock, panorama, large, dense, wide, bark

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

Boulder and Eroded Cliff Face

May 8, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning sun backlights receding eroded ridges and boulder in the coastal mountains of California’s Big Sur coast.

I now am not quite certain where this exact spot was… but somewhere along the Big Sur coast in the area of Garrapata State Park – there is a pretty good chance that it is just a bit north of Rocky Creek bridge and just south of the actually Rock Creek. (Where there is a restaurant which has, or so I hear, a wonderful view and very high prices.) As I probably mentioned in photos I posted earlier from this May 1 shoot, one subject that I was pursuing was the morning light from the sun as it just barely topped the high and steep mountains along the coast highway. This creates at least two interesting conditions, and both are present in this photograph: diffused and hazy light as the sun shine though very thin fog rising up the canyons from the ocean, and thin lines of light along the tops of ridges and peaks.

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: big, sur, eroded, ridge, grass, light, edge, atmospheric, recession, diagonal, lines, flora, plants, foliage, rock, boulder, landscape, nature, scenic, travel, california, usa, north america, haze, fog, morning, spring, gully, mountain, hill, valley, gully, stock

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

Soberanes Canyon, Morning Light

May 6, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 3 Comments

Morning light and morning fog fill the upper reaches of Soberanes Canyon, Big Sur, California.

I’ve driven past the trailhead for Soberanes Canyon many times. The trail starts at a curve in the Coast Highway above a popular portion of the rugged beach at Garrapata State Park. This time, as I came past heading south I noticed brilliant light in the steep canyon above the trailhead caused by light shining down from the tops of the peaks through the slightly foggy atmosphere. I didn’t stop right away – I had a different objective further down the coast in mind – but I made a mental note to take a look on my way back north, thinking that I’d probably be back within a half hour or so.

I did return shortly. I parked, loaded up the photo gear, and headed up the trail towards the canyon. I wanted to try to make a photograph that captures the intensity of the light-filled atmosphere created when a steep canyon like this is filled with slightly hazy air – the light is so bright that you almost cannot look at it, but when you do look the light seems almost palpable and the receding ridges of the canyon form interesting patterns before the furthest of them virtually disappear into the light. My first stop was at a small footbridge crossing a creek. This might have made a beautiful photograph – with lush green plants and wildflowers lining the small, rushing creek and the mountains beyond – but I couldn’t find a composition that would work, do so I continued on a bit. Soon I came to a more open area where the trail curved above the floor of the canyon near a cactus-covered slope, and from here the view into the upper reaches of the canyon was unobstructed.

As I framed up several compositions of the ridge patterns of the canyon the light continued to change – one moment it was smooth and undifferentiated, but the next a bit of fog would come through and brilliant clouds would sit on top of the ridge. In the end I wasn’t completely satisfied with the result – but I’m going to think of this as work in progress, and I’ll be back to try to photograph this canyon and these conditions again.

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.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4 L USM at 84mm
ISO 125, f/11, 1/400 second

keywords: ridge, atmospheric, recession, distance, canyon, mountain, hill, steep, fog, mist, haze, morning, light, back light, upper, reaches, brush, chaparral, garrapata, state, park, california, usa, north america, big sur, coast, pacific, ocean, highway, trail, scenic, travel, landscape, nature, valley, stock

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

Rugged Coastline, Big Sur

May 5, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Black and white photograph of rough surf and rugged coastal rocks and cliffs along the Big Sur Coastline of California at Garrapata State Park.

This is, to my mind, an astonishingly rugged and wild bit of coastline at Garrapata State Park, south of Carmel, California in the northern section of the Big Sur coastline. I made the photograph from the edge of a bluff above the rocky coast, at a spot where I could shoot south along the shoreline and toward a section of coastline where the contour headed back towards the west. While it was a clear morning with only a bit of fog along the tops of the nearby hills, the surf was big enough to fill the air with a thin mist which created the atmospheric recession effect in this photograph.

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.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 L IS USM at 360mm
ISO 100, f/16, 1/80 second

keywords: garrapata, state, beach, park, big, sur, rock, island, stack, cliff, outcropping, pacific, ocean, sea, shore, coast, shoreline, rugged, crashing, rough, surf, wave, foam, bird, atmospheric, recession, morning, light, black and white, monochrome, highway, one, seascape, landscape, nature, travel, scenic, stock

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