Tag Archives: mule

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Hills and Gullies, Twenty Mule Team Canyon

October 17, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning light across the shapes of hills and gullies, Twenty Mule Team Canyon, Death Valley National Park.

This is a photograph I made back in 2009 when I managed to get to Twenty Mule Team Canyon before sunrise and then continued to shoot for several hours. Though this area is very close to one of the most popular and oft-photographed locations in Death Valley National Park, it gets relatively few visitors from what I’ve seen. While it doesn’t generally present the huge and expansive vistas of some of the more famous areas, it is a great playground for those of us who enjoy the eroded and rounded landforms and the seemingly infinite variations of color and texture.

Here I tried to fill the frame completely with these shapes that have been produced by water eroding the relatively soft earth. The light was very interesting and a bit complex. Some diffused light was coming straight down from the sky, hence the bits of blue shadow in some of the gullies. At the same time, slightly diffused sunlight was directly striking the earth in a few spots. And in some of the foreground areas additional illumination was being reflected into the scene from nearby formations.

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.

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Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Eroded Gullies at Zabriskie Point, Morning

September 1, 2011 G Dan Mitchell 3 Comments

Low angle morning light illuminates a tortured landscape of eroded gullies at Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park.

I recently “rediscovered” this photograph while undertaking a major review of the past eight years of my raw files. (And, yes, that task is just about as much fun as you might imagine. It would actually be pretty unbearable except that every so often I find some photographs that I had perhaps forgotten or overlooked, and I also come across images that remind me of experiences that took place some time ago.)

This photograph was made, as virtually anyone who has visited the spot recognizes, by pointing my camera about 90 degrees to the left of the classic Zabriskie Point views. Timing was important, as the early light is just skimming across the tops of these tortuously eroded gullies, picking out the ridges between them but leaving the lower sections in shadow. But good fortune also played a role here. Death Valley is usually a clear blue sky kind of place, but on this morning I had clouds! At dawn, if I recall correctly, the clouds actually interfered with the light a bit. But as the sun rose the clouds provided a more dramatic background than plain blue sky and created some softer and diffused light that gave just the right sort of dynamic range for photographs.

On a technical note, if you are viewing this in the right web browser you can mouse over the image and see a summary of basic EXIF data. (Sorry, but this feature only works in web browsers – if you are viewing email, etc. you’ll need to visit the version at my blog to see the EXIF.) If you do check the EXIF you might notice that this photograph was made with a very humble example of photographic technology, the Canon Digital Rebel XT. This camera is a 8MP cropped sensor “consumer” camera that I acquired when I first tested the waters of DSLR photography. (I had actually used digital cameras back in the 1990s, but not for serious photographic work.) Those who wonder which of today’s current DSLRs might enable them to produce interesting and effective images might consider what could be done with such a humble camera. ;-)

(Basic EXIF data may be available by “mousing over” large images in posts. Leave a comment if you want to know more.)

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Wildlife, Photographs: Yosemite

Mule Deer, Tuolumne Meadows

July 23, 2009 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A mule deer grazing in the early evening light at Tuolumne Meadows, Yosemite National Park, California.

This California mule deer was conveniently grazing among the new wildflowers in this green meadow right next to the Tuolumne River bridge between the Tuolumne Campground and the Lembert Dome parking lot. How could I resist stopping and grabbing a few shots! When I arrived I first noticed another photographer working very close to the deer in the meadow, so I decided to shoot from the roadside rather than joining the other shooter – I didn’t want to be responsible for scaring the critter off and ruining his opportunity and mine. Eventually he retreated to a spot next to the bridge and the roadway so I slowly worked my way into a position that I thought might place some interesting light from the low sun on the deer. Most of the time the hungry deer kept its snout buried deep in the meadow plants, but every so often it would stand erect and look (and listen!) around, at which point I could squeeze off a few shots.

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

keywords: deer, mammal, wildlife, animal, nature, fur, ears, graze, evening, tuolumne, meadows, yosemite, national park, california, usa, grass, plants, face, heard, upright, alert, travel, mountains, sierra nevada, range, mule, Odocoileus hemionus

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert

Sunrise Light, Twenty Mule Team Canyon

April 30, 2009 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Detail of eroded formations at dawn in Twenty Mule Team Canyon, Death Valley National Park, California.

This photograph is pretty much all about the light – though the interesting and varied patterns of the wildly eroded hills in Twenty Mule Team Canyon also help.

Twenty Mule Team Canyon is just a short distance up the road from the famous and iconic Zabriskie Point (a downright iconic photograph of which I recently posted here). But while the throngs gather at Zabriskie every morning before and at dawn – with good reason – almost no one is to be found here during this time of beautiful light, even though it is in some ways almost as amazing as Zabriskie. I made this photograph at that magic moment when the sun was just coming over a nearby ridge and we see full sun on the formations at the upper right but somewhat subdued light closer in the foreground.

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

keywords: twenty, mule, team, canyon, death valley, national park, california, usa, sunrise, dawn, light, erosion, folds, gully, ridge, hill, geology, colors, rock, dirt, gravel, pattern, shadow, landscape, detail, scenic, travel, stock, abstract

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