Tag Archives: pine

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Pine Trees, Morning

August 17, 2015 G Dan Mitchell 1 Comment

A small grove of high elevation pine trees in morning Sierra Nevada light

Although I visit the Sierra frequently, it has been some time since my last real backpacking trip and even longer since I last me up with my “Talusdancers” friends. The Talusdancers go way back — to a time about two decades ago when a loosely organized group of us began joining regularly for Sierra backcountry trips that ranged from a few days to longer than a week. In early August I had the opportunity to get these things back on track, with a three-day backpack trip in the eastern Sierra with three of the old gang. I arrived before the others, was on the trail by mid-afternoon, and had set up camp and was fixing dinner before the sun set. My friends apparently got to the trailhead much later and didn’t start hiking until about 6:00 PM. As the sun was setting I heard the “holler” of my friend Owen coming from across the valley, and I yelled back to let him know I as there. They soon arrived, and I can report that there are few things more wonderful that meeting up in the backcountry with good friends you have not seen for some time!

Our camp was on a rise above the shore of a sub-alpine lake, a very familiar Sierra Nevada setting. Beyond the lake to the west the terrain rises, past more lakes and thinning trees, into the alpine zone, and eventually to Sierra crest peaks and ridge lines. To the east there was a long valley with several more lakes, ending at a drop off between the descending canyon walls, and in the far distance we could see the high desert of Owens Valley and even further off the line of the White Mountains. We camped in the midst of an open grove of small, high-elevation lodgepole pines, common Sierra trees, but always beautiful in the early morning light.

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

Trees, Crack System

December 15, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A group of small trees find a marginal existence growing along a crack at the edge of an exfoliated slab of granite, Yosemite National Park

It took me three tries, on successive days, to finally get the photograph of this little bit of granite slab and trees that I was looking for. On evening of our first day camping in the vicinity we were under the thick smoke plume from the early September “Meadow” fire in Yosemite, which was burning some miles away in the Little Yosemite Valley area — but also sending dense smoke towards us and dropping ash from the sky. I did make a few photographs in this eerie light the first night, but it was a very tricky situation that did not work well for this subject. I went back on the second evening, when the smoke had diminished at our location to the point that it wasn’t a major factor in “intimate landscape” photographs like this one. I went to the top of a large granite bowl before the light was good and scouted for likely photographs to make as the evening light improved. I spotted this lengthy crack at the edge of an exfoliated granite slab, in which a number of small trees had taken tenuous root and decided that it could be an interesting subject with evening sidelight. I wasn’t the only one, however, and three members of our party had the same idea! We are a cooperative bunch, so I photographed some other things while my partners worked this spot, and then returned to set up a shot that looked more directly up the length of the crack that curves through the composition in this version. Later that evening I was quickly reviewing my shots from the day, and I realized that one of my buddies had cast a long shadow into part of the frame! Ah, well, such things happen.

So I made plans to go back yet again on our final evening in the area and try once more. In the end, I’m glad that I did. I’m now convinced that by going back I found a more interesting composition that accomplished several things. First, no one’s shadow is in the image! Second, I think that positioning the large crack so that it curves more diagonally through the frame works better than my original composition. Third, due to this different camera position and somewhat different light, I was able to let the shadow of the tree create a sort of mirror image of its form, resulting in a relationship between the tree and the shadow that I like. There are spots much like this one all over the place in Yosemite — smooth slabs of granite on which tiny but often mature trees manage to find just enough sustenance. In this little spot, a somewhat unusual number of these trees seem to have made a success of it.

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are 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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Tree, Reflecting Puddles After Rain

December 13, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A small pine grows from a crack at the end of a small rainwater pool reflecting golden morning light from overhead mountains

Among those who have visited this place, the small tree in this photo has perhaps become almost iconic — though, in truth, if you look you can find such trees all over the high Sierra. Each seems to me, upon reflection, to be a bit of a small miracle. Like this one, they often manage to grow in incredibly challenging circumstances. In addition to the usual stresses of the high country, these trees found themselves sprouting in a world of almost unbroken granite, perhaps finding barely enough water and soil in small cracks or shallow rainwater pools to get get started, but then constrained by these conditions to lives of very slow growth and a marginal existence. I missed it, but a friend who was there with me pointed out that this is actually a mature tree, producing seed-bearing cones and likely quite old.

The location is such that the tree is in shadow for a long time in the morning. I have photographed it at other times of day when the light is “better,” but I also like soft shade light and thought I’d give it a shot. Above and beyond this slab and the tree there are higher granite walls, and they catch the morning sun — and from just the right angles that golden glow is reflected in the pools around the tree, here filled by rain from the previous day.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite, Post-processing Workflow

Trees, Granite Slabs, Morning Light

December 10, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Trees scattered along granite slabs are backlit by morning light, Yosemite National Park

I am a complete sucker for scenes with scattered trees, separated enough to allow light to pass, that are backlit by morning or evening sun. Among my photographs, they are a bit of a theme, or so I’ve been told, but they are also almost an icon of the Sierra for me. When I think of the term “range of light,” it is most often this light that comes to mind. I know that I’ve always been intrigued by light that makes the atmosphere glow, is so bright that it is hard to look into it.

Early on this morning I began by making a bee line for this rounded granite ridge at the top of a large system of sloping slabs above the lake where we were camped. Initially I was thinking of the location as a place from which to photograph distant subjects in a different direction, but once at this high point, with the sun spilling brilliant light my direction after having just topped the farther ridge, I turned my attention to these trees and rocks, backed by luminous haze and more granite, tree-covered slopes leading toward a higher ridge.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: pine

Pine Trees, Morning

Trees, Crack System

Tree, Reflecting Puddles After Rain

Trees, Granite Slabs, Morning Light

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