Tag Archives: photographer

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: People, Photographs: People In Landscape, Photographs: Photographers, Photographs: Southern California

Photographing the Canyon

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Photographing the Canyon
Patricia Emerson Mitchell photographing in a desert canyon, Death Valley National Park.

Photographing the Canyon. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Patricia Emerson Mitchell photographing in a desert canyon, Death Valley National Park.

My photographs of desert canyon landscapes are virtually always devoid of people. Without some frame of reference it is difficult or even impossible to judge the scale of these places — a cliff could be four feet high or forty, a rock might be a pebble or a boulder. This photograph includes my wife, Patricia Mitchell, at work photographing a section of a narrow desert canyon in Death Valley back in late March.

I often favor longer lenses for landscape photography, but in these canyons I usually use an ultra-wide lens. The canyon walls are only feet apart in the narrowest places, and often the view forward and backward may stretch no more than a few dozen feet. Photographing as a duo in such a place requires teamwork, and each person typically must work alone — or all of the photographs will feature other photographer! She went first as we re-entered this canyon. I followed, and initially photographed back in the direction from which we came. Once she moved forward I turned my attention into the canyon and then kept my distance so that we would not interfere with one another’s compositions.

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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Owens Valley, Photographs: People, Photographs: People In Landscape, Photographs: Photographers, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Photographer Patricia Mitchell

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Photographer Patricia Mitchell
“Photographer Patricia Mitchell” — Photographer Patricia Mitchell at work in early morning autumn light in the Eastern Sierra Nevada.

Someone has a birthday this week, so it seems appropriate to feature a photograph of, um, someone here. Photography is often a solitary activity — one person, a subject, a camera, how to see — and most of the time the two of us photograph alone. But every so often we get a chance to head out together on a trip that involves photography. We had such an occasion earlier this fall — and it has been too long! — when we did a weeklong trip that took us to the Eastern Sierra Nevada and then to Utah and a few nearby locations.

We started in the Sierra, where we headed into the eastern part of the range in search of fall color. Perhaps “search” is the wrong word here, as it is easy to locate! Instead of going to the “usual places” we wandered up some less-travelled roads, including the one that took us to this spot right beneath the eastern escarpment, a place with very few other people where the high desert and the beginnings of true mountain terrain intersect. We arrived on a brilliantly lit morning, with fall color everywhere, and a bit of early snow still on the peaks.

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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” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Afternoon Haze, Ridges

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Afternoon Haze, Ridges
Forested ridges, silhouetted in the afternoon Sierra haze, on opposite sides of the Tuolumne River Canyon.

Afternoon Haze, Ridges. © Copyright 2021 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Forested ridges, silhouetted in the afternoon Sierra haze, on opposite sides of the Tuolumne River Canyon.

A group of us were camped at a backcountry lake in Yosemite National Park for the better part of a week a few years back. Actually, we’ve done that a few times now that I think of it. This lake is a quiet and gentle place, surrounded by forest, but with a few nearby peaks and on one side a huge vista into and across a deep river canyon. Our little group photographed the heck out of this place, working the landscape morning and evening, and gradually working outwards to learn more of the surroundings.

On this evening I had hiked up from the lake through a narrow band of forest, then continued to ascend across granite slabs through more open country. Arriving at a high point I turned around and looked back over the basin holding “our” little lake and waited for the colorful evening light. Of course “waiting” doesn’t mean sitting and doing nothing — it means photographing other things, including this other tree-covered rocky ridge running down toward the lake and the further landscape whose details are muted by late-season haze. If you look very closely you might just make a sort of “Where’s Waldo” discovery in this scene….

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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature

Photographer In The Landscape

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Photographer In The Landscape
A solitary photographer works the evening light in a dust storm, dwarfed by an immense landscape of dunes and desert mountians.

Photographer In The Landscape. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A solitary photographer works the evening light in a dust storm, dwarfed by an immense landscape of dunes and desert mountians.

You may wonder about the title of this photograph: “What photographer?” You’ll need to look closely, especially if you are looking at a smaller version of the photograph. The photographer is small! Or, more accurately, this landscape is very big.

There are some experiences in the landscape that are particularly powerful. Some are hard to articulate. Once, many years ago, I wandered away from the rest of my party at a timberline camp, sat on the ground and just looked, and I experienced a sudden sense of connection and content in that landscape that I’ve been unable to describe in words. On another occasion — halfway through a two-week solo backpack trip — it seem like the right thing to just sit atop a 12,000′ pass for a couple of hours. Many of these moments seem connected to the experience of being a very small figure in a very large landscape like this one.

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.