Tag Archives: national

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

Granite and Trees, Olmsted Point

September 12, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Lone trees stand among glacial erratics on granite slabs near Olmsted Point as evening light strikes Clouds Rest and Half Dome, Yosemite National Park.

This photograph was made near the popular and iconic Olmsted Point along Tioga Pass Road (highway 120) across the Sierra through Yosemite National Park. The spot is a short walk from the busy parking lot, but even this five or ten minute stroll was enough to get me some relative solitude on this summer evening.

The combination of close granite slabs, glacial erratics lying about, more distant domes and peaks, and a few scattered trees says “Yosemite” to me in ways that are more true than even the iconic scenes from The Valley. Almost every area of the high country was shaped by glaciers, and all of these things are a direct result of that origin. Another thing that I like about this photograph, ironically, is that there is really nothing all that special about it! There are a few high, thin clouds – but no towering thunderheads. The light is warming as the end of the day approaches – but this is not yet prime golden hour light. And although at least one icon appears in the scene, it is not even the dominant feature.

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Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects

Doorway, Battery Spencer

September 9, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning sun on a doorway at historic Battery Spencer, Golden Gate National Recreation Area.

The Marin Headlands area of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, just across the bay from San Francisco, is full of old military installations that once guarded the entrance to San Francisco Bay. I’ve been intrigued by these facilities for some time, but my interest was sparked again after seeing the San Francisco Opera production of Wagner’s “Ring” cycle earlier this year, in which some sets were inspired by these structures.

Battery Spencer is one of the most accessible of these sites, though in some ways it may be overlooked since many people simply walk through or past it on their way from the parking area to a very popular and spectacular viewpoint just above the north end of the Golden Gate Bridge. But in the right conditions of atmosphere and light this area can provide a lot of interesting photographic possibilities. This open doorway, lit my morning light, is along a passageway between a number of structures that are half buried in the hillside here.

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

Siesta Lake, Summer

September 4, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The middle of a summer day at Siesta Lake, Yosemite National Park.

And, surprise!, yet another photograph dredged up from the archives during my summer crawl through the past eight years of raw files.

Siesta Lake is probably well-known to almost anyone who has driven across Tioga Pass Road (highway 120) from west to east through Yosemite National Park. As the road ascends from into the higher elevations, at one point it rounds a turn and there on the right is this pretty and peaceful little lake, right next to the road, surrounded by trees and boulders, and often with water lilies floating on its surface. Few can resist a quick stop, unless they are in a real hurry or have stopped there many times before. I’ve stopped there lots of times, but I still do pull over for at least a quick look.

This photograph of the lake is a bit unusual for me in a couple of ways. For one thing, it was made during the middle of the day, during those hours that are not supposed to be conducive to photography – and, in fact, which can be very challenging. But on this day there was a thin layer of overcast broken by thicker clouds, and this somewhat muted the midday intensity of the light. In addition, I think that I most often work close views of the grasses and, especially, the flowers growing in the lake – but here I stood back a bit and took in everything from the foreground to the trees on the opposite shore. Finally, the vast majority of photographs I’ve made here are in landscape (wide) orientation, with some even going all the way to 2:1 panoramic formats and beyond.

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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. ;-)

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