Tag Archives: orange

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

Conway Summit Aspens in Rain

October 4, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 7 Comments

Fall rain and mist mute the colors of the extensive aspen groves above Conway Summit on Highway 395 in the eastern Sierra Nevada.

Just back from the eastern Sierra an hour or so earlier, and I want to get something posted before going to bed – so here is more or less the last photograph I made today. It rained lightly (and sometimes more heavily) all day, starting when I woke up in Bishop Canyon, continuing as I photographed in that general area until the early afternoon, and then following me north as I headed up to the Lee Vining area. Although I saw a few spots of sun as I drove towards this huge aspen grove near Conway Summit, by the time I arrived it was raining steadily. My plan was to decide here whether to continue my aspen hunt into the evening as I drove further north… or to recognize that the weather was going to be an issue and instead head up Tioga Pass and over the pass to return home.

Since it was raining at Conway Summit, after stopping to make a few exposures (including this one) I headed back to Lee Vining and then up to Tioga Pass. This Conway Summit photograph probably illustrates some important variables of landscape photograph in general and aspen photography specifically. Based on visits to this area in previous years, I was expecting less color than I found – while a lot of trees were still green, the higher trees had turned their most intense colors, and sections of the lower groves also were quite colorful. Despite the planning that gets me to places like this at the right time of day and at about the right time of the year, some things cannot be controlled – in this case, it was the weather. Also, even though I came here with a fairly specific shooting plan, once I arrived the conditions were tough enough that I had to work quickly. Fortunately I know this place pretty well, so I was able to find the scene I wanted to shoot without a lot of searching and I was then able to capture a few frames quickly… and get back into the car and out of the rain!

This photograph is 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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Dusk Clouds, Badwater Basin Salt Flats

April 28, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Late light illuminates dusk clouds above the salt flats of Badwater Basin, Death Valley National Park, California.

First, my disclaimer: I really am getting very near the end of the photographs of Badwater Basin shot on this late March evening. Really, I am. I’ve posted a number already, but I don’t see how there could be possibly be more than two additional images at this point. :-)

To recap, for anyone who didn’t catch the earlier posts, I visited this spot near Badwater Basin on an evening that turned out to have a wonderful combination of somewhat unusual salt flat conditions and interesting evening clouds. The “unusual conditions” were due to recent heavy rains in Death Valley that had flooded this section of the the salt flats a few weeks earlier. The flooding had subsided – at this point there was some water below the salt crust but the surface was mostly dry – but the character of the salt “polygons” had been “reset to zero” by the water. What had been very jagged and worn and cracked material had been flattened and smoothed. While the joints between the sections of the salt are clearly still visible, they were almost flush with the surface of the flat at this time.

On top of this somewhat rare condition, I was very fortunate to be there on an evening when there were clouds and, in addition, the cloud conditions evolved beautifully as the evening progressed. I saw this possibility earlier in the afternoon, which was one reason that I chose to shoot here, but you can never really know for sure what will happen… until it happens. The clouds started out thicker than what is seen in this photograph but as the day came to an end they began to thin and separate – enough that the colorful light from the evening sun began to light the clouds during the last moments of the day.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 17-40mm f/4 L USM at 17mm
ISO 100, f/16, composite of two photographs at .4 and .8 second exposure time

keywords: late, evening, sunset, dusk, clouds, sky, light, orange, blue, pink, badwater, basin, salt, flat, polygon, white, death valley, national, park, california, usa, north america, landscape, nature, scenic, travel, mountain, amargosa, panamint, range, horizon, stock

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Dusk Clouds, Badwater Basin Panorama

April 24, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 5 Comments

Colorful dusk clouds against darkening sky above the salt flats of Badwater Basin and the distant ridges of the Amargosa and Panamint mountain ranges.

This was one of the final photographs I made in fading light on this evening. (I made another series a few minutes later when the sky and clouds and salt flats were all various stages of blue – I may ultimately post that image here as well.) The very last light was catching the clouds above Badwater and the central portions of Death Valley, and the color was already fading quickly in the darker area to the east over the Amargosa Range.

As I have mentioned before, the very wide dynamic range between the shaded surface of the salt flats and the bright bit of sunlit cloud and sky at the far left necessitated the use of two exposures which were then combined in post. (Even after this light finally faded I was not yet finished for the day. An hour or so later I was doing night photography under the light of the rising full moon at Zabriskie Point.)

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 17-40mm f/4 L USM at 17mm
ISO 100, f/16, composite of two exposures in the 1/2 to 1/4 second range.

keywords: badwater, basin, salt, flat, polygon, pattern, white, texture, panorama, evening, sunset, twilight, dusk, dark, sky, color, orange, pink, blue, amargosa, panamint, mountain, range, ridge, horizon, death valley, national, park, california, usa, north america, landscape, travel, scenic, nature, stock

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Salt Flats and Sunset Clouds – Near Badwater

April 6, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 5 Comments

Sunset clouds above the patterned salt flats near Badwater, Death Valley National Park, California.

This photograph was made in the evening at the “secret” spot on the salt flats just south of Badwater. Reports and photographs from this location a couple weeks ago indicated that it had been flooded by earlier heavy rains, but by the time of my visit there was little standing water left here, with the exception of a few open spots (one seen in the middle distance on the salt flats) – though it did appear that the flats might still be wet beneath the salt crust. Walking on this was an odd experience that reminded me a bit of walking on newly frozen winter ice. The appearance of the salt flats was quite changed by the water. Typically the ridges between the flat “polygon” sections of the salt are more distinct, being as tall as a few inches and sometimes almost seeing to break over one another like the edges of ice floes. But at this stage the flats are almost, well, flat.

Shooting this scene in the evening often provides a few technical challenges. In the past I’ve shot from a lower camera position in order to get a closer view of the salt. This time I decided to place the camera bit higher so that I could capture a larger expanse of the salt flat texture. Another issue is the color of the salt. We “know” that salt is white, and when one walks on the playa it registers as white to the eyes/mind. But if you observe carefully – or look at a photograph later – you find out that this salt is anything but white, mostly because it is illuminated entirely by the open sky and therefore picks up the sky coloration. When the sky is clear the salt can become so blue that corrections are needed, in my opinion, during post-processing. On this evening the blue was not as pronounced since the colorful clouds balanced it out to some extent. A third issue is the tremendous dynamic range of the scene, ranging from some very bright sky below the clouds near the left side of the frame, through the much less brightly-lit salt flat, to the very dark foothills on the horizon at the right. In order to manage this I had to do two things. First, instead of using a graduated neutral density filter to lighten the foreground and control sky brightness, I made two exposures one stop apart and combined them in post. Secondly, I used layers to separately adjust sections of the image, primarily differentiating between the salt (which need to be lightened up a bit) and the sky (where the brightest areas needed to be controlled).

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 17-40mm f/4 L at 17mm
ISO 100, f/16, composite: 1/6 second and 0.3 second

keywords: badwater, salt, flats, polygon, pattern, playa, death valley, national, park, california, usa, north america, evening, dusk, sunset, cloud, colorful, pink, orange, blue, sky, landscape, nature, light, travel, scenic, geology, mountains, stock

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