Tag Archives: north

Shop Windows, Night

Shop Windows, Night
Lights left on for the night in a shop at the Mare Island Naval Ship Yard.

Shop Windows, Night. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Lights left on for the night in a shop at the Mare Island Naval Ship Yard.

Returning to this photograph a bit more than eight years after I made it, I no longer recall the specifics of the scene — the nature of the work done in this shop, its exact location, why the lights were still on late at night. I can say that I photographed it at a place where I have photographed a lot over the past 15+ year. During those years I have watched the location change from an abandoned ship yard (which is still its predominant quality) to a place where some of the old buildings have been reclaimed by new tenants. (One impressive old abandoned building is now… a distillery!)

I’m often intrigued by what we can and cannot see when we look through the windows of places like this. I know that there must be a small world in this room, where people work together daily on some kind of productive activity, where they share the language of their professions, and were many of the things I see through the window have meaning that I cannot understand.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

Blog | About | Flickr | FacebookEmail

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

Scroll down to leave a comment or question.


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

Redwood Forest Plants

Redwood Forest Plants
“Redwood Forest Plants” — Detail of plants growing on the redwood forest floor.

We are perhaps spoiled somewhat here in my part of California. We take redwood forests for granted — both the coastal trees and the sequoias found in a few areas of the Sierra. Because I’ve been around these trees almost all my life, I forget sometimes how remarkable they are. Ironically, it is frequently while traveling to other places where forest trees are not of such gigantic size that I realize how shocking their scale can be.

At the same time, familiarly helps me look past the trees themselves and see smaller things that might be overlooked by a person walking through these forests with neck craned upwards in marvel. There is actually a lot taking place right down on the ground, especially during the wet season. I made this photograph one march in redwoods just north of San Francisco.


Leave a comment or question using the form. (Click the title to see the full article and to comment if you are viewing it on the home page.)

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others.

The Back Door

The Back Door
The rear entrance to a local market.

The Back Door. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The rear entrance to a local market.

So, can we imagine that this is the, uh, “urban wilderness?” It does contains some relatively very wild areas, and there is wildlife of a sort. If you look around carefully enough at the right time you can find a degree of solitude.

This is a back entrance to a grocery store, photographed across a deserted parking lot. Someone has abandoned their cart next to the door, perhaps expecting the store employees to discover it there and reclaim it.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

Blog | About | Flickr | FacebookEmail

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

Scroll down to leave a comment or question.


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

Urban Scene from Pandemia

Urban Scene from Pandemia
Vehicles and an old house in Pendemia

Urban Scene from Pandemia. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Vehicles and an old house in Pendemia.

Our world, and welcome to it. For the great majority of us, normal activities have been put on hold, including our regular trips into the natural landscape to make photographs. Some possibilities are opening back up — I’m hoping to visit redwoods and the coast before too much longer. But as case numbers tick back up, it becomes clearer that we are not going back to “normal” for a while.

So I walk. All over my local neighborhood, generally in perhaps a two or tow-and-a-half mile radius. One thing I can be grateful for — though probably not the only thing — is that I’m “discovering” neighborhoods and features within walking distance that I would not otherwise have seen.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

Blog | About | Flickr | FacebookEmail

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

Scroll down to leave a comment or question.


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