Tag Archives: new york

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Manhattan Traffic

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Manhattan Traffic
Manhattan Traffic

Manhattan Traffic. New York, New York. August 5, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Motion blur abstract of Manhattan traffic

OK, here we go! I’m about to share a string of urban photographs, many of which are from New York City, where I spent slightly more than a week in early August. We were there for several reasons. My wife was attending a music conference at NYU. (A conference of oboe and bassoon players, if you wondered.) Her brother and sister-in-law live in Brooklyn and graciously agreed to host us during our stay, and our two sons also live in Brooklyn. For me this meant that I had the better part of a week to simply head out into Manhattan and Brooklyn, going wherever my intuition took me, and make photographs of the city.

A lot of the photographs fit into the street photography genre — which may seem a bit perplexing to those who know my landscape and nature photography — but this first one is more of an abstraction, created my means of a slow shutter speed and camera motion, most likely as I was crossing some busy street in midtown Manhattan.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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.

Morning Musings

Morning Musings (8/17/14)

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If you don’t already follow The Online Photographer (or “TOP”), wander on over there and take a look. The slightly idiosyncratic blog often offers articles and commentary that provide interesting insights and which might make you look at things a bit differently. I read it regularly.

I’m mentioning TOP this morning because of something I saw there recently, a “something” that is directly related to this post, namely the TOP posts shared as “The Morning Coffee.” These are typically relatively short posts on a variety of subjects and at least giving the feeling of being somewhat informal posts written over a cup of coffee.  Hey, I’m usually up early. I drink coffee. I like to write. Hence my own new “Morning Musings” series. We’ll see where it leads.

My “musing” for today relates to something from my recent trip to New York City. The brief story — likely to be expanded upon soon in other posts — is that I got to spend about a week wandering around Manhattan and Brooklyn with a camera. I had been thinking about doing some handheld night street photography for some time, and I had the opportunity on this trip. On one particular night, after emerging from a musical performance at a club, we headed off toward another performance in a nearby park. As we walked, hours after sunset, I pulled out my smaller “street” camera with a f/1.4 lens, raised ISO to 1600 or 3200 and started shooting. The ability to do this — shoot handheld in the middle of the night — was incredibly liberating. I’ve done a lot of tripod-based traditional night photography, but the technology of these newer cameras lets us shoot the night in an entirely different way, capturing quickly appearing subjects and conditions in ways that were essentially impossible only a few years ago. (Photos upcoming in the next week or two.)

Musing written. Coffee consumed. Now off to make some photographs…

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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: New York City, Photographs: People, Photographs: Urban/Street

Family Portrait

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Family Portrait
Family Portrait

Family Portrait. New York City. December 28, 2013. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Brandon, Jameson, Lia – Central Park

A “snap” of family in Central Park, New York City from last December, when we spent a week visiting relatives and wandering around New York City. This photograph was on a cold winter day when we joined throngs of New Yorkers (and, like us, temporary New Yorkers) in the park.

I was shooting mostly in a manner that is much different from the way I might shoot landscape. Using a very small handheld camera and (mostly) a single prime lens, I shot while moving from place to place. Especially in the case of photographs of people, I did not always necessarily try for perfect camera stability—and the resulting motion blur somehow can seem consistent with the experience of the place. This photograph was grabbed very quickly, as we emerged from an underground walkway into the edge of the outside light.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Winter Trees, Statue, Central Park

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Winter Trees, Statue, Central Park
Winter Trees, Statue, Central Park

Winter Trees, Statue, Central Park. New York City. December 28, 2013. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Barren winter trees and statue in Central Park, New York City

At the end of 2013 we spent a week in New York City, devoting our time to a combination of family visits and exploring the city and surroundings. We staying in Manhattan and did a lot of walking and subway riding there, but we also got up to the north as far as The Cloisters museum and also spent quite a bit of time in Brooklyn.

We managed to miss the worst of the tough winter weather in New York. We had some rain on one day, and there was the tiniest flurry of snow on another near the end of the trip. For Californians from the San Francisco Bay Area, it seemed cold, but not nearly like it would be starting a few days after we left, when cold conditions and very heavy snow arrived. All of this was great for us since we wanted to walk and photograph a lot. On one day we decided to wander around in Central Park. It was a beautiful winter day, with mostly blue skies and clear air. The park was crowded with plenty of other people who were taking advantage of the opportunity to get out. As we wandered around I carried my small rangefinder-style camera and mostly shot quickly and spontaneously, focusing on whatever happened to catch my attention—a group of trees, tall building surrounding the park, people, and so on. Here I tried to fill the frame with the stark, twisted forms of these barren winter trees against the clear sky… with a small surprise in the lower left corner.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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.