Tag Archives: nevada

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Aspen Grove, Yellow and Green

October 20, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The transition from green to yellow foliage in an eastern Sierra Nevada aspen grove

Aspen color is a more complex and fascinating thing than what if first seems — and that first impression is quite a strong one to begin with. The first thing most of us see when we learn about aspens is simply “brilliant color,” enhanced by the tree’s juxtaposition with other spectacular landscape elements and amplified when the trees are seen in vast and colorful groves. In fact, there are few things more astonishing than a huge grove of aspens at peak fall color, stretching up and across a sub-alpine landscape on a fall day.

Once you catch the aspen bug — and have seen quite a few of those vast and colorful groves — subtler things start to become interesting. There are too many elements to fully describe them all in this little post, but they include the patterns produced by the white trunks, almost regardless of leaf color. The color shadings are more varied than we first see — from the first lime-green hints of upcoming color change, through the spectrum of colors encompassing yellow and gold and red and orange and brown, and including the subtler effects of brown and black leaves late in the season. When I saw this vignette (within a much larger grove) my firs thought was perhaps “not quite at peak,” but I think that the combination of a few leaves just arriving at near-peak color against the background of leaves yet to change is pretty interesting, too, especially when the scene is cut through by those stark white trunks.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Eastern Escarpment

October 19, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The eastern escarpment of the Sierra Nevada rises from desert hills to rugged aretes lit by dawn sun

Depending on how you approach the range, the Sierra Nevada presents two quite different aspects to the visitor. For many decades, as a long time resident of the San Francisco Bay Area, I was only familiar with one of them. I always came to the range from the west, on long drives over coastal mountains and then across the Great Central Valley. As I approached the east side of the Valley I would encounter the low hills, at first almost imperceptible, that humbly mark the beginning of this might range. Because it tilts upward from the west, the western slopes are overall very gradual. Rising through these first low hills, the grass and oak covered landscape raises over a distance of many miles, and it is quite a while before the range starts to feel like “the mountains,” and many hours before the visitor arrives in the high alpine zone of rugged granite peaks. Even here, to the west of the crest there are plenty of gentle valleys and meadows.

The east side is a radically different world, as I finally began to understand two or three decades ago. The eastern base of the range is an arid near-desert place, made more so by Los Angeles’ historic draining of east side waters that once irrigated now-dry places and once filled today’s dusty playas with shallow lakes. The Sierra rises abruptly from this lower landscape, and in places you can look up nearly 10,000′ to the highest summits — you stand in desert and look at alpine peaks, and you see every zone in between. I made this photograph at dawn from one such valley location where the landscape that of sagebrush and playa and alkali lakes. From this spot I looked across low hills with the first coniferous trees toward the abrupt rise of the eastern foothills, backed by jagged and rugged slopes leading upward to high peaks.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Hillside Aspen Grove

October 16, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Colorful autumn aspen trees ascend a hillside in Bishop Canyon, California

I love to photograph aspens in soft light, either very early in the morning or in the evening, when the trees are in shadow. This light enhances the colors of the trees and it fills in the shadows, creating an appearance that does not have the stark quality sometimes seen in midday sunlight aspen groves. I waited until the last hour or so of daylight to photograph this area, at which time the sun has already dropped behind the summits of the surrounding peaks.

This photograph takes in a small section of a much larger grove of colorful trees, at every stage from fully green to complete bare. I sometimes like to simply stand for a bit in front of such a grove, staring at the colors and patterns and trying to find small sections that might make a composition. Here I think I was first attracted to the bright leaves on the small trees near the top, but soon I saw the diagonal arrangement of the rows of trees. Each row has its own character. That primary row near the upper part of the frame is at its color peak, but in front of it there is another row of trees that seems to be going more quickly from green to bare. In the background there is a line of much larger trees, with their tall and straight white trunks.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Slender Aspens, Autumn

October 15, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Slender aspen trees with fall foliage grow high on a Sierra Nevada slope

Sierra Nevada aspens come in a tremendous variety of shapes and sizes. On rocky, dry slopes, where the trees seem to eke out an existence in truly marginal conditions, they are frequently small, with skinny branches and sometimes a bit of a haggard look. In other areas, perhaps influenced by the quality of the soil, they have stout trunks but never get very tall, instead growing in bent and twisted shapes. In a few places, often in the bottom of valleys, they may take on the classic aspen shape — tall trees with straight trunks — though this is less common in the Sierra than in some other places. Sometimes they grow very high on rugged slopes, like the trees in this photograph, and while they are relatively straight and shapely trees, they are also very small.

This group grows high on a slope above an area of dense, tall, and thick aspens, and those other trees usually attract more attention with their dense leaves and intense fall colors. But sometimes I almost like these smaller trees more, especially when some of their leaves have fallen and their bare, white trunks are more visible. Even more, I like to photograph them early and late in the day, when the light reflected into shaded areas warms and intensifies the colors and fills in the shadow.s

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: nevada

Aspen Grove, Yellow and Green

Eastern Escarpment

Hillside Aspen Grove

Slender Aspens, Autumn

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