Tag Archives: people

Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Pedestrians, Slanted Street

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Pedestrians, Slanted Street
Pedestrians walk past mailboxes on a slanted San Francisco street

Pedestrians, Slanted Street. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Pedestrians walk past mailboxes on a slanted San Francisco street

A scene like this could probably be distressing to OCD photographers who (like me!) often like to have things line up on logical ways. Or it can be pleasure for someone (also like me!) who loves contemplating perspective and other types of visual dissonance. I actually played around with this, seeing what would happen if I used post-processing techniques to align the image with various potential vertical or horizontal references… and there isn’t one that actually works and leaves the other references also all correct!

This sort of scene is pretty typical in San Francisco. I don’t know the people in the scene, but their appearance is congruent with that of the new inhabitants of San Francisco: tech workers, finance workers, and others who support them. (I believe we can even see the ubiquitous paper coffee cup in the hands of one of the figures.) The scene is typical in other ways as well, including the standing street and the buildings aligned to the gravitational horizontal, and ignoring the actual slanting terrain in order to get there.

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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: France, Photographs: Night, Photographs: Urban/Street

La Pierrade, Evening

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La Pierrade, Evening
The sidewalk and street in front of La Pierrade, Montmartre, Paris.

La Pierrade, Evening. © Copyright 2016 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The sidewalk and street in front of La Pierrade, Montmartre, Paris.

I made this photograph on, literally, our first night in France ever. (Yes, we are late-bloomers when it comes to international travel. That’s a long story involving finances, bringing up a family, strong interest in visiting other places, and more.) We had been in London for over a week — not our first visit there — and had arrived in Paris by train in the afternoon, finding out way to our hotel in Montmartre, unpacking, and then deciding it was time to head out and explore. (Here I could tell another funny story on us, involving our discovery that you can get an espresso just about anywhere in this part of Paris, but I’ll save that one for another time, too.)

When we went out we had several goals. One was testing our ability to navigate in a city whose language we do not speak. (It was fine.) Another was to start to get a fix on the surrounding neighborhood. A third, and may be most important, was to find something to eat! That’s hardly a problem in Montmartre, though deciding which place to patronize was challenging. At the intersection where I made this photograph we finally picked one and enjoyed a simple meal outdoors. Whether this is visible in this small online photograph or not is a question, but there are some interesting interactions going on among the people in this nighttime sidewalk scene.

See top of this page for Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information and more.

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: New York City, Photographs: People, Photographs: Urban/Street

Layers, Contre-Jour

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Layers, Contre-Jour
People sitting in Metropolitan Museum windows, plus worlds on both sides

Layers, Contre-Jour. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

People sitting in Metropolitan Museum windows, plus worlds on both sides

This is yet another take on the scene in this room at the New York Metropolitan Museum, on a cold day when hordes of people went to a warm museum instead of wandering outside. The window faces south, into the midday and afternoon sun, and the window sills provided an inviting and warm place for people to sit. I spend a bit of time here and observed as people passed by, came in and sat down, and moved on.

There may be more going on here than is immediately apparent. The first impression is of a half-dozen people sitting in or near the windows, with outdoor backlight providing the illumination. (Hence the “contre-jour” indication in the title of the photograph.) But there are several other layers. In the far distance Manhattan buildings near the south end of Central Park, whose trees are providing silhouetted shapes below the skyline. There are also reflections from the interior of this room in the windows — keep in mind that elements near my camera position were front-lit by the windows. There is actually quite a crowd reflected in the windows, and if you look closely you can even spot the photographer.

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: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Museum Windows, Shadows

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Museum Windows, Shadows
Silhouetted figures, windows, and beams of light, Metropolitan Museum

Museum Windows, Shadows. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Silhouetted figures, windows, and beams of light, Metropolitan Museum

This is a second “take” on a location I photographed between Christmas and New Year’s Day last year, when we spent a week in New York. It was an exceptionally cold week, and on a few days we decided that we really needed to find indoor activities. (On other days we defied the cold and wind and walked all over Manhattan anyway.) One of the reliable options is a visit to a museum, so we headed to the Metropolitan, where we wanted to see the David Hockney show. You can’t see it in this photograph, but the museum was packed with other visitors who were also looking for a warm, indoor option.

We passed through this room twice, on our way to and from a section of the museum with relatively modern art that we wanted to view. This space is really essentially a very wide walkway, though I suspect that it could also be used for exhibits at times. The row of tall windows along the southern wall opened to Central Park and, further away, the Manhattan skyline. Lots of people took advantage of the wide window sills as a place to sit. The resulting effects of light were intriguing — backlit people in a variety of poses, the faint image of the park and city outside, and the alternative effects of shadows and reflections from the bright light streaming through the windows.

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 | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | LinkedIn | Email

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