Tag Archives: national

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

Morning Light, Redwoods

August 3, 2013 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Light beams shine between redwood trees, Muir Woods National Monument

During essentially the entire month of July, in what is typically my prime time for being in the Sierra and other wild places doing landscape photography, we were instead traveling in the UK, Germany, and Austria. It was a great trip – and I’d do it again in a heartbeat! – but I’ve missed my natural world here in California, and it was about time to return to it. So I marked the first day of August by getting up well before the crack of dawn and heading north across the Golden Gate to spend a morning in the cool and quiet of redwood groves. (To those who have been to Muir Woods when it is, as is too often the case, overrun by tourists from San Francisco, I’ll just say that if you go very and on the right day, you can briefly have the place almost to yourself.)

I was the first or perhaps second person to arrive at Muir Woods, well before the gates were open and the kiosks manned, so I loaded up the camera gear and ambled slowly into the park, taking in the cool air, the quiet, and the soft early morning light. I had to particular photographs in mind, so I just took the time to go slowly and look around. In the end, I came back with perhaps four that I like – which is a pretty good haul! – and the others might be just a bit less iconic than this one. I made this photograph at just about the time I had decided that my work for the morning was done – the sun was getting high in the sky and creating the hard-to-photograph “pizza light” and more visitors were starting to show up. As I turned around to start back I saw this small grove above on the hillside, with some light beams passing through the branches, so I switched lenses and made this photograph.

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

Devils Cornfield, Morning

July 30, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Early morning light on Devils Cornfield and receding ridges, Death Valley National Park

I’m a fan of shooting in the very early morning – what photographer isn’t? – and of shooting directly into the brilliant light of the rising sun, especially when that light shines through an atmosphere containing haze or dust. These conditions appeal to me in a variety of ways. The inclusion of this haze emphasizes the effect of atmospheric recession, and sometimes the most distant elements of the scene can fade to near invisibility as the atmosphere lowers the color saturation and contrast of the scene. Shadows, especially if bit of detail can be retained, can produce dramatic contrasts, and light glancing across the edges of features such as plants can be intensely colorful.

This photograph includes features of a scene that is easily accessible but perhaps one that people don’t often spend much time considering, especially at this time of day. Most photographs of the area that I see are made in fairly normal daytime light or perhaps in the warm and clear light of the evening golden hour. Here I found a slightly elevated camera position and aimed across the tops of clumps of grasses, a small nearby hill, and a succession of higher and more distant ridges leading away toward the mountains along the east side of the valley.

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

White-Faced Ibis

July 26, 2013 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

A white-faced ibis about to land in a San Joaquin Valley marsh.

A month or two earlier I had come across a large number of white-faced ibises in this precise spot along the perimeter road around this marshland where many, many migratory birds are found this time of year. The group of them was on the ground, apparently feeding in a wet grassy area, and they were quite shy about my presence, moving back from me as I came up alongside the on the road. On the day when I made this photograph, I had not noticed any of these birds at all. In fact, I had stopped here to photograph some ducks when I happened to look up and see this single bird angling in for a landing. I swung my camera around and tracked it to its landing.

I have a few random-sounding observations about the white-faced ibis. First, unless I’m missing something, they really don’t seem to have white faces! The beak is lighter than the bird, but that’s about as close to a white face as I can can find on these birds. Second, their coloration makes them difficult to photograph effectively. They are quite dark-colored birds, though their features can have a slightly colored iridescence that seems sort of reddish to me. Because of this, if I try to enhance the shadowed areas of the very dark birds in post, this coloration can quickly start to look fake. (In fact, I’ve seen a number of photographs of these birds that attempt to make them look lighter than they are, but which instead just end up looking odd.) They do make a fine photograph in silhouette, especially when a flock of them flies overhead early or late in the day.

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

Spring, Oaks, El Capitan Meadow

July 25, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Green grass and new oak leaves, El Capitan Meadow, Yosemite Valley

Probably almost anyone who has photographed in Yosemite Valley much can recognize this sort of scene and perhaps even think of some favorite spots to find black oak trees with new spring growth, set in meadows and backed by forest. Even though this is a very dry year in The Valley – and in almost all of California – around the beginning of May the annual “greening” of the Valley did take place, and this photograph was made during that period.

When lit from behind and above, the light coming through the new oak leaves is luminous and the colors can take on an intensity that sometimes cause me to describe this as the “impossibly green season” in California. Perhaps it is because the state is brown, tan, or gray during so much of the year that the spring green seems so intense.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: national

Morning Light, Redwoods

Devils Cornfield, Morning

White-Faced Ibis

Spring, Oaks, El Capitan Meadow

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