Tag Archives: ridge

Photographs: Nature

Spring Bloom, Valley and Mountains

Image Leave a comment
Spring Bloom, Valley and Mountains
Morning fog thins above a landsape of spring wildflowers stretching from valley to mountaintops.

Spring Bloom, Valley and Mountains. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Morning fog thins above a landsape of spring wildflowers stretching from valley to mountaintops.

As I continue to mine the archives of raw files from 2019 during these “shelter in place” days of 2020, here is another photograph from about this time in 2019, when I was traveling around California to enjoy and photograph a rather remarkable spring bloom. After abundant Winter and early Spring rain, the landscape was coming to life in spectacular fashion.

To make this photograph I headed out into the center of this plain — actually more of a very wide valley between two mountain ranges. Here the flowers grew in patches of similar colors — orange here, purple there, and yellow almost everywhere. The carpet of colorful wildflowers spread across the plain, up into the foothills, and extended almost to the summit if these distant mountains.

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.

Scroll down to leave a comment or question.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Ridge, Last Light

Image Leave a comment
Ridge, Last Light
The last evening light strikes the top of a Sierra crest ridge

Ridge, Last Light. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The last evening light strikes the top of a Sierra crest ridge.

As a photographer of landscapes I like to think of myself as being something of a connoisseur of sunsets. Hey, I’ve seen a few of them! There is not denying that it is a special time of the day, just like dawn, when the landscape undergoes a rapid and often striking transformation, made more notable against the backdrop of daytime light that changes very slowly. As the day comes to an end the changes accelerate — shadows lengthen, the sun approaches the horizon or other blockage, the color of the light warms, and distant clouds and other features begin to affect the local scene. Quickly the light disappears, leaving some alpenglow if you are lucky, and then the transition slows again as darkness falls.

Over several evenings it became obvious that this ridge above our camp was the last one to get the sunlight. Since we were camped to the east of the Sierra Nevada crest, there was little full-on sunset light here. However, given the curved shape of the upper canyon and the high peaks on the crest, there were a few spots like this one that were open to the light coming from far to the west. On this evening some clouds assembled above the ridge, creating a more dramatic backdrop.

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.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Clouds, Evening Sky

Image Leave a comment
Clouds, Evening Sky
Sunset clouds above the Sierra Nevada crest, John Muir Wilderness

Clouds, Evening Sky. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sunset clouds above the Sierra Nevada crest, John Muir Wilderness.

Sierra skies will please or distress you, depending upon your relationship to them and to light. Many visitors absolutely love the days-long stretches of perfect blue skies that occur here, frequently uninterrupted by any clouds at all. (These conditions are among those that give rise to the “Range of Light” designation for these mountains.) On the other hand, photographs often find these “perfect” conditions to be boring, and you might be surprised to hear us complain about too much blue sky!

Our late-August arrival at this location was accompanied by rain during the afternoon on the day we hiked in — no downpours, but enough to gently soak everything and persuade us to put on parkas and set up tents. On the second day we had a few more clouds… but that was pretty much it. The rest of our stay (with the exception of our walk back out, when it did rain again) featured — you guessed it — one of those “days-long stretches of perfect blue skies.” So, after days of such aggravatingly perfect weather, we were absolutely thrilled when these lovely sunset clouds drifted over our valley in the evening on our last full day, glowing with gentle color against the deepening blue of the evening sky.

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.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Ridge And Lake, Twilight

Image Leave a comment
Ridge And Lake, Twilight
The last twilight alpenglow on peaks above a John Muir Wilderness lake

Ridge And Lake, Twilight. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The last twilight alpenglow on peaks above a John Muir Wilderness lake.

A group of us spent last week base-camped at 11,000′ in the Eastern Sierra Nevada, in an open landscape of lakes, meadows, granite slabs, and high ridges. Our most pressing concerns were making photographs, reveling in our surroundings, and enjoying one another’s company. We do this every year — some have been doing it for nearly two decades, I’ve been part of it for about ten years, and we added one new participant this time. In some following posts I’ll have more to say about the goals and experience of such a thing.

Because of our location, each evening the final light would fall on a long ridge above a high, glaciated valley to our southeast. Although the sun had already set, this high spot was open to light coming from the other side of the Sierra crest, far to the west and perhaps even along the distant Pacific coast. Set against the twilight sky and shadowed nearer landscape of rock, water, and trees, this last bit of light was dramatic, and it never failed to capture our attention.

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.

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