Tag Archives: peak

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

Aspen Branch and Leaves

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Aspen Branch and Leaves
An aspen branch bearing leaves at the peak of autumn color, Eastern Sierra Nevada.

Aspen Branch and Leaves. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

An aspen branch bearing leaves at the peak of autumn color, Eastern Sierra Nevada.

This is another photograph made during a brief “up close and personal” ramble through an aspen grove that was absolutely full of the widest range of aspen color I have seen — the full gamut of green, yellow, gold, orange, red, and even a few tan or brown leaves.

I enjoy taking a break from typical landscape photography, which tends to focus on the large view and on producing an image of the scene that evokes its reality to some extent, and working these tiny “intimate landscapes” with their immense range of variables. The scene may contain as little as a single leaf and rarely includes more than four or five, and the juxtaposition of the leaves within the group and against the background provides lots of room for experimentation. Here I used a macro lens with a large aperture so that I could could separate the relatively crisp foreground leaves from the amorphous and blurred background.

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.

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

Autumn Lake, Dawn, Eastern Sierra

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“Autumn Lake, Dawn, Eastern Sierra” — Dawn light comes to an Eastern Sierra Nevada lake surrounded by autumn aspen trees and reflecting distant peaks.

Yes, this is a bit of an iconic spot, but with good reason. And this year the colors around this Eastern Sierra Nevada lake were exceptional. I first photographed here before it became the often over-busy place it is today, so I’ve seen the color transition here many times. It has been about a decade since I saw colors like what I found this year. The most striking thing this year was the abundance of red and orange colors, something we don’t see every time.

The circumstances of this photograph were a bit complex. I was camped nearby the night before, and at sunset a thick cloud of suffocating wildfire smoke descended from the Sierra crest. I almost packed up and left, but then I decided to at least stick around for the night and see what the morning might bring. It was still smoky in the morning though not quite as bad as the previous night. Figuring that the smoke would be even worse farther to the north, I decided to head to this nearby lake. The smoke muted the light quite a bit, but because the smoke is not consistently thick there were moments when it thinned and more directional light appeared. I decided to simply set up in one spot and patiently wait for those momentary changes in illumination.

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.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Autumn Cottonwood, Canyon Walls

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Autumn Cottonwood, Canyon Walls
An old canyon cottonwood tree approaching peak fall color, Utah.

Autumn Cottonwood, Canyon Walls. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

An old canyon cottonwood tree approaching peak fall color, Utah.

A small group of photographers spent a day exploring this out-of-the-way canyon far out in the Southern Utah backcountry. If a friend had not shared the location with us I probably never would have gone here, and I am deeply grateful that he introduced us to the place.

We began at a totally nondescript pull-out off of a long gravel road, a place where I would never have expected to find such a canyon. We began walking on the dry flatlands and soon dropped into a shallow canyon with some sandstone along the bottom. As per the common pattern, as we walked the side walls began to quickly rise above us, and before long we were deep in a beautiful and lonely canyon. My recollection is that we saw no one other than our party that day. This grizzled old cottonwood stood near the junction of our canyon and a side canyon seen in the upper background.

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.

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

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Dusk, From Boulder Mountain

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Dusk, From Boulder Mountain
A distant peak in sunset light beyond autumn aspens in the Boulder Mountain area.

Dusk, From Boulder Mountain. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A distant peak in sunset light beyond autumn aspens in the Boulder Mountain area.

This photograph marks a step in my process of learning about the remarkable landscape of southern Utah. I’ve written previous about how I managed to miss photographing Utah for a long time — it is a long story having to do with Sierra obsessions and family travels though less visually stimulating portions of Utah when I was very young. My first real photographic visit was in the early 2000s in the springtime… and I was taken by this landscape. On our way across the state we passed through the Boulder Mountain area, and I made a mental note to try to revisit this area’s extensive aspen groves in the fall.

A few years later we went back in autumn, on a long trip that started in the Eastern Sierra, crossed empty areas of Nevada, and arrived in Southeast Utah… where I discovered that fall colors arrive earlier there than in the Sierra. When we eventually worked our way across Boulder Mountain it was clear that we were catching the tail end of the aspen colors, and many groves were already bare. At dusk we found a location where lines of still-colorful trees alternated with bare trunks. Among the photographs I made was this one, looking toward the last light on the Capitol Reef area and higher mountains beyond.

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 | Facebook | Email

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

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