Tag Archives: peaks

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: People In Landscape, Photographs: Travel

Spring On The Plain

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Spring On The Plain
A lone horseback rider heads onto a California plain filled with spring wildflowers and backed by distant snow topped peaks.

Spring On The Plain. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A lone horseback rider heads onto a California plain filled with spring wildflowers and backed by distant snow topped peaks.

Continuing today with the bittersweet 2020 theme that is a combination of “wish I could be here” and “at least I can take a virtual trip,” here is a photograph from Spring back in 2019, when I was out and about and making photographs in several beautiful areas of California. (In truth, my current situation is much better than that of many other people — I don’t have that much to complain about — so let’s focus on the positive here!)

I had spent part of a couple of days exploring and photographing this area as I passed through on my way to a California desert location. Most of the time was spent making pure nature photographs, but I couldn’t resist taking advantage of a serendipitous moment when a group of horseback riders wandered into the foreground of this grand vista of flower-covered plain and distant snow-capped mountains.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Timberline Lake, Soft Light

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Timberline Lake, Soft Light
Quiet morning light at a Sierra Nevada timberline lake.

Timberline Lake, Soft Light. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

An alpine stream descends through a boulder-strewn, meadow-filled Sierra Nevada valley.

I photographed this scene in what a colleague refers to as “the quiet light” — the soft light in shade, found here during the daytime but also found before sunrise and after sunset. This lights is not as striking as the more dramatically colored light of sunrise and sunset, but it has a special peaceful quality.

The lake wrapped around our basecamp, with nearby streams flowing into and out of it. The rocky shoreline on the far bank is backed by tiny bits of meadow, some trees, and a series of rocky benches rising to a low, glaciated ridge. Beyond that — and not visible from here — is an alpine lake. And above that rocky talus slopes rise toward the base of the highest peaks, in a world of rock.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Peaks and Lake Shore

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Peaks and Lake ShorePeaks and Lake Shore
Sierra Nevada peaks tower about a rock-line alpine lake.

Peaks and Lake Shore. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sierra Nevada peaks tower about a rock-line alpine lake.

True confession time — my “photographic core” is and probably always has been black and white photography. Today the majority of my photographs are in color, and I love working whit color images. But I began with black and white, way back when I was just a kid using a cheapie camera on family vacations. Later my father took me into his home darkroom and I learned to make prints, black and white essentially by necessity in those days. My early photographic heroes were almost all black and white photographers.

All of that is by way of explaining the inclusion of this black and white photograph among all of the other color photographs from this trip, a one-week backcountry visit in the Eastern Sierra Nevada. We looked at this scene daily — it was only steps from my tent — and over the week we got to know its details and its moods well. I made this photograph late in the day, as shadows lengthened across the low, rocky saddle, and the more distant peaks lost most of their sunlight.

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.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Ridge And Lake, Twilight

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Ridge And Lake, Twilight
The last twilight alpenglow on peaks above a John Muir Wilderness lake

Ridge And Lake, Twilight. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The last twilight alpenglow on peaks above a John Muir Wilderness lake.

A group of us spent last week base-camped at 11,000′ in the Eastern Sierra Nevada, in an open landscape of lakes, meadows, granite slabs, and high ridges. Our most pressing concerns were making photographs, reveling in our surroundings, and enjoying one another’s company. We do this every year — some have been doing it for nearly two decades, I’ve been part of it for about ten years, and we added one new participant this time. In some following posts I’ll have more to say about the goals and experience of such a thing.

Because of our location, each evening the final light would fall on a long ridge above a high, glaciated valley to our southeast. Although the sun had already set, this high spot was open to light coming from the other side of the Sierra crest, far to the west and perhaps even along the distant Pacific coast. Set against the twilight sky and shadowed nearer landscape of rock, water, and trees, this last bit of light was dramatic, and it never failed to capture our attention.

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.

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