Tag Archives: print

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Aspen Grove Below South Lake

October 23, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

A dense aspen grove in full fall color near South Lake in the Bishop Creek drainage

I have been returning to this little group of trees for several years now. There are many like it throughout the eastern Sierra, but somehow this group has come to seem like “mine” and I shoot it every fall. There is nothing obviously special about it – it is not some sort of landmark location, and you would easily pass right by it if you happened to be there and look in a different direction. It is up a somewhat obscure little dirt road that goes no where in particular.

At the right moment in the fall season the grove turns completely golden-yellow with the exception of some years when it seems to hold a bit of orange or red, if I recall correctly. I like to arrive in the early evening just as the sun is about to dip behind a nearby ridge and bring soft, shadowed light to this spot. This year I had thought that I might be too early, since I would more typically shoot there perhaps a full week into the month of October, but this has been an early season for aspen color in the Sierra and in a number of other areas of the west as well.

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: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

First Light, Sabrina Basin Aspens

October 22, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

First morning light traverses groves of golden autumn aspen trees, Sabrina Basin

There is a particular spot in the Sabrina Basin from which I can look down into a deeper portion of the valley where the sunlight does not hit the trees until hours after sunrise. When photographing in this area I almost have a ritual I follow: begin just before dawn at a higher location and shoot in the very first morning light, explore this higher area for an hour or more as the light builds, then leave and begin the descent back into that valley – first photographing it from above as the sun begins to top a tall ridge to the east and its shadow moves across the groves of trees in the bottom of the valley, and then working within the valley-bottom groves.

This photograph was made during those moments when the sun first began to rise over that high ridge, and the sun/shadow line began its traverse of the aspen groves that line the bottom of the canyon. Here the light had reached the first trees closet to me and was just beginning to work its way back toward the further groves that were still in deep shadow.

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: Sierra Nevada

Autumn Aspens, Sabrina Basin

October 21, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Aspen trees with golden autumn colors, Sabrina Basin near North Lake

I had heard reports that the eastern Sierra aspen color was not very good at the beginning of October this year, and I already know that it was an unusual season with an earlier-than-normal color change. (I had seen some early color back in the middle of September while on a short backpack trip.) People I trust and whose reports I read had visited the area shortly before I did, and some of them had reported poor color and even trees that can lost leaves at the start of the month. Since I only really had a single day for Sierra aspen photography this year I was hopeful that they were wrong or at least that I could find a few trees in good shape, since sometimes a single branch with colorful leaves can be enough.

Much to my surprise, when I traveled up into the Bishop Creek drainage on October 3, I found a lot of excellent color. Maybe I just looked in the right places or perhaps I got lucky, but I found wonderful opportunities to photograph the aspens, and in many places I found trees at their peak of color. (This was, indeed, perhaps a week earlier than what I would expect in a more typical year.) These trees are part of a well-known group that is not far from the North Lake area – the morning light just clearing the ridge to the left of this scene and the wispy clouds were pluses.

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

Lodgepole Forest and Lower Slopes of Mount Gibbs

October 19, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Lodgepole forest trees and the lower slopes of Mount Gibbs are bathed in sunset light, Yosemite National Park.

This was an evening of “interesting” (e.g. – tricky!) light that changed from moment to moment. The issue was that there were high clouds to the west of my position not too far from Tioga Pass. These clouds can cut both ways – on one hand they can be lit up in quite astonishing ways by the light at the end of the day and just after sunset, but they can also quite simply block the light from the west. When I see this situation in the Sierra, I often make a point of being where I can take advantage of the potential for a wild show of sky color, but I’m also aware that as often as not nothing will happen and the sun will simply slide behind the clouds. On this evening things were complicated. Earlier there was a wonderful atmospheric haze that became luminous in the back-light. However, as the sun dropped toward the horizon, at times it did pass right behind clouds that were thick enough to block its light and turn the world quite gray.

Eventually I figured out that light was going to be transitory and unpredictable on this evening, so I more or less settled into “opportunist” mode, ready to move quickly when a bit of light showed up in one place or another. With a somewhat long lens on the camera, I would wander around or just stand and watch. Then, almost without warning, something would light up – a tree over there, a ridge behind me, some clouds – and provide a momentary opportunity to make a photograph. At the point that I made this photograph, in subtle, rose-colored light, I had almost given up since the trees around me had fallen into shade. But a brief bit of sun came through a break in the clouds near the horizon and lit the nearby grove as the slopes of Mount Gibbs became pink in the end-of-day light.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: print

Aspen Grove Below South Lake

First Light, Sabrina Basin Aspens

Autumn Aspens, Sabrina Basin

Lodgepole Forest and Lower Slopes of Mount Gibbs

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