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Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Desert Wash at Base of Tucki Mountain, Dusk

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Desert Wash at Base of Tucki Mountain, Dusk
Desert Wash at Base of Tucki Mountain, Dusk

Desert Wash at Base of Tucki Mountain, Dusk. Death Valley National Park, California. March 29, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Soft rose-colored dusk light illuminates an alluvial fan below a canyon at the base of Tucki Mountain, Death Valley National Park.

This is one of several photographs from the recent Death Valley trip that beg the question, “Is that color real?!”*

Yes, this really is the color of the light from this scene.

I learned quite a while ago that the interesting light most definitely does not end at sunset – often the best and most interesting light comes after the sun has set. Sunset on this evening had been quite interesting, but a few minutes after the sun set the last brilliant red light struck high clouds overhead and lit up the entire scene with this lurid and intense wash of color.

The scene is a large desert gravel wash where a drainage canyon spills out into Death Valley at the base of Tucki Mountain and forms a huge alluvial fan. I had climbed to the top of a low hill to shoot late afternoon and sunset light, so I had a good vantage point to view this wash beyond intervening hills. Tucki Mountain itself is a massive lump of a mountain that rises above Stovepipe Wells – what it lacks in terms of an impressive and jagged summit peak in makes up for by means of its sheer bulk. It constitutes a large spur off of the Panamint Range and almost seems like a small sub-range all by itself.

*After I originally wrote the text to this post I made a 12″ x 16″ test print of this photograph. As I often do, I put the print out on a table in our living room so that I can see it in a context other than that of my small studio. My wife, who is a very perceptive viewer and who has seen the results of, uh, printer errors (for real fun, print on the back side of your paper by accident some time…) looked at these colors and said, “Is something wrong with your printer?” Ah, I love critics! ;-)

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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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Dusk, Death Valley Ridges

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Dusk, Death Valley Ridges
Dusk, Death Valley Ridges

Dusk, Death Valley Ridges. Death Valley National Park, California. March 30, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Dusk light on ridges above Death Valley, California.

This photograph was made in the evening from Aguereberry Point, high in the Panamint Mountain Range along the west side of Death Valley. The point is a spectacular overlook with panoramic views in all directions. The number of visitors is relatively low since it is at the end of a gravel road and is a good long drive from most of the places where people tend to stay when they visit the park. It is also windy!

(Those who read the brief technical information about the photographs might wonder at my use of ISO 400 for a landscape photograph – but when shooting at 400mm in windy conditions, a lower ISO makes it darn near impossible to deal with camera vibrations.)

The range of lighting conditions and effects as the day comes to an end at Aguereberry Point is tremendous. To the west (roughly behind me and over my left shoulder as I shot this photograph) the sky is very bright as the sun drops towards the distant Sierra Nevada. Below the Valley and the canyons along the mountains on either side gradually dim and become hazy. As the sun drops and is blocked by intervening peaks and mountain ranges, even the higher peaks and ridges take on these subtle and pastel shadings. It probably isn’t too important to identify the specific ridges in this image, but they are to the northeast of the point. The nearer ridge is along the west side of the Valley (probably part of the Tucki Mountain complex) and the further ridges are a much greater distance to the northeast across the upper Valley.

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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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Lower Slopes of Tucki Mountain, Dawn

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Lower Slopes of Tucki Mountain, Dawn
Lower Slopes of Tucki Mountain, Dawn

Lower Slopes of Tucki Mountain, Dawn. Death Valley National Park, California. March 31, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Dawn light on the faces and gullies of the lower slopes of Tucki Mountain, Death Valley National Park.

On the final morning of my recent (March, 2011) visit to Death Valley I decided to go to a spot not far from my campsite at Stovepipe Wells where I know of a bit of raised terrain that provides large-scale views of big chunks of this part of the Valley. I arrived before dawn and lugged my gear to the top of this rise with the primary plan of using a long lens to photograph across the Mesquite Dunes toward the Cottonwood Mountains at sunrise.

However, when standing in a spot like this one there are so many interesting effects of light all around that it is impossible, for me anyway, to just shoot that one thing. Far up the Valley to the north light starts to hit the highest peaks of several mountain ranges, to the east the light comes through and illuminates morning haze and layers of low hills, and to the southwest of my position the light began to reach the top of Tucki Mountain. So, between photographs of my intended subject to the west, I swung the camera though the entire 360 degrees to photograph many of these other subjects.

Tucki Mountain has fascinated me since I “discovered” it one morning while shooting on the “back side” of the Mesquite Dunes. At dawn I had been photographing the low dunes and other features on the side of the dunes that cannot be seen from the usual roadside viewpoints. As the light changed I worked my way up into the dunes a bit to photograph the shapes and textures of the sand, and I saw a composition that included this massive mountain to the south with it dark and jagged features. It was only later that I found out that it was Tucki Mountain. (If you have visited Stovepipe Wells, you have been right below the mountain.) It is a huge, sprawling peak – almost more of its own small range than a simple peak, or so it seems to me.

On this morning I first saw a big of the deep red first dawn light hitting the top of the peak and noticed lower ridges starting to pick up traces of this light. I swung that tripod head around to point this direction and decided to tightly frame some images of the overlapping ridges and valleys ascending toward the peak as the light worked its way down toward the Valley floor.

G Dan Mitchell Photography | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Email
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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Red Cliffs, Dawn

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Red Cliffs, Dawn
Red Cliffs, Dawn

Red Cliffs, Dawn. Death Valley National Park, California. March 30, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Dawn light on the Red Cliffs, near Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park.

The Red Cliffs (sometimes, I think, also called the “Red Cathedral”) are close to the famous spire of Manly Beacon at Zabriskie Point, and off the right a bit from the typical vantage points. The light was quite special – at least when not blocked by the clouds! – on this morning. These interesting clouds against the pastel blue sky first caught my attention, and were actually my primary interest in making this photograph. While the early light was on the clouds, some soft light also filtered through low clouds to the east and created a subtle glow on the face of this feature.

The Red Cliffs are really an amazing feature, though are often overlooked in favor of the more prominent and iconic Manly Beacon. The cliffs can often can be difficult to photograph – at least for me! When more direct light hits them the large dynamic contrasts between the areas in the light and the much darker shadows are tricky to handle, so this cloud-softened light seemed like just the right thing.

And, yes, I was at Zabriskie Point. It is a long story, but I have mentioned before that I have a personal project to photograph things other than the iconic scenes of Zabriskie. (Which is not to say that I won’t point my camera at those while I’m there it it turns out to be worth it!)

G Dan Mitchell Photography | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Email
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.