Tag Archives: olmsted

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

Juniper Trees, Morning Light

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Juniper Trees, Morning Light
Juniper Trees, Morning Light

Juniper Trees, Morning Light. Yosemite National Park, California. July 28, 2011. © Copyright 2011 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Morning light falls on rugged Juniper trees growing in glaciated terrain near Yosemite’s Olmsted Point.

The Yosemite high country along (and beyond) Tioga Pass Road, which crossed the Sierra through the national park, is a land shaped by glaciers. The night before I had decided that the morning photography subjects would be in an area of granite domes, glacial erratics, small ponds, and rugged granite-bound trees in an area generally centered around the iconic Olmsted Point viewpoint.

My first subject, generally defined, was going to be an area of large granite slabs on a ridge that I knew would be hit by the early morning sun shortly after sunrise. I arrived in the general area after dawn but before the direct light arrived here, and I headed up the slabs to scope out possible subjects. The atmosphere was quite hazy, which can be a mixed blessing for photography. On one hand, distant subjects are muted an indistinct. On the other, the light on closer subjects can be diffused and soft, and this helps fill in shaded areas. It also means that more distant background elements can be muted both in contrast and color saturation. When I found this rugged cluster of old juniper trees, I looked for a composition that would catch the first light striking them from behind and also include a bit of the more distant exfoliated dome as background.

G Dan Mitchell Photography
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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Trees and Sunset Sky, Olmsted Point

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Trees and Sunset Sky, Olmsted Point
Trees and Sunset Sky, Olmsted Point

Trees and Sunset Sky, Olmsted Point. Yosemite National Park, California. June 18, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Trees growing on granite silhouetted against a colorful sunset sky at Olmsted Point, Yosemite National Park.

This astonishing, magical light occurred just at and right after sunset on the evening of June 18, the day that Tioga Pass finally opened for the 2011 summer season. I earlier posted a vertical format photograph of much the same scene, though with slightly different light – the other photograph was made about a minute after this one and the conditions were changing very rapidly.

The photograph was made from the popular Olmsted Point overlook along the Tioga Pass Road (highway 120), with its well-known view of subalpine Tenaya Lake. Since I have recounted the story of this light in some detail in an earlier post, I’ll keep this description somewhat short, but here is the genera outline. Earlier in the evening I had come here to try to photograph Mount Conness with a long lens. Initially the light was very unpromising, but I observed some things that suggested the possibility of sunset light so I stuck around. Just before sunset, as the sun dropped near the horizon to the west, the light came from below to illuminate the thin, high clouds and produce an amazing color show.

To make the series of photographs of these trees I simply pivoted my tripod around from the direction it had been pointing, towards Mount Conness. The trees are somewhat sparse here since the granite domes and slabs cannot support many of them. The speed of light and color transition was remarkable. At one or more points, as the clouds picked up the sunset glow, the brightness of the light suddenly increased noticeably. The brightest color moved across the sky from east to west, and here the color was just beginning to diminish ever so slightly overhead as it continues to intensify to the west and closer to the horizon.

G Dan Mitchell Photography
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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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Trees in Silhouette, Olmsted Point, Sunset

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Trees in Silhouette, Olmsted Point, Sunset
Trees in Silhouette, Olmsted Point, Sunset

Trees in Silhouette, Olmsted Point, Sunset. Yosemite National Park, California. June 18, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Trees at Olmsted Point are silhouetted against a brilliantly colorful spring sunset sky, Yosemite National Park.

I think everyone should occasionally get to post a just plain gaudy color sunset – and this is mine. While photographing Mount Conness from Olmsted Point was my primary goal on this evening, I also had some opportunities to swing the tripod around and point at other things from time to time. This is about as close as I can come to capturing the nearly hallucinogenic color of the sky as the brightest cloud illumination was centered directly overhead and beginning to move off to the west.

The color saturation was so intense that I had to under expose this by at least a stop in order to avoid blowing out the red channel and in order to retain some differentiation among the various shadings of color as they transitioned from very pink/red through orange and purple and on towards blue.

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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.

Commentary, Ideas, Photograph Exposed, Technique

A Photograph Exposed: A Tale of Light

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(“A Photograph Exposed” is a series exploring some of my photographs in greater detail.)

On the weekend of June 18-19 of this year I made a point of getting to Yosemite so that I could photograph the high country on the first day that Tioga Pass Road was open for the season. On a shoot like this, my subjects range from some that I planned to shoot ahead of time to some that were completely unanticipated. Among the many things that might affect my decisions is the light itself, and this is a story about that light… and perhaps a few other things, too.

I had driven to the park very early on Saturday morning and after photographing straight through the morning I finally made it over the pass and headed down to Lee Vining Canyon to find a campsite for that night. After getting up at 3:30 a.m. and driving to the Sierra from the SF Bay Area and then shooting all morning, I was exhausted! I pulled into the first available site, paid my fee, and promptly fell asleep in the car for perhaps an hour. When I woke up I set up my camp and at about 3:00 or so headed down to Lee Vining to get some “dinner” – on “photographer time,” dinner tends to either be very early or very late, and on this day I made it early so that I could be back up in the park well before the “good light” started.

Heading back up to Tioga Pass after my mid-afternoon dinner, I had a few subject ideas in mind. Tuolumne Meadows itself was one possibility, and I knew that I wanted to watch for any cascades or creeks that would be flowing in the spring snow-melt conditions. Tenaya Lake was another possibility, and a client’s interest in photographs of Mount Conness had me thinking about the possibility of a photograph from Olmsted Point that included ice-covered Tenaya Lake and this peak. Continue reading A Photograph Exposed: A Tale of Light →