Tag Archives: san jose

Photographs: Urban/Street

Free Couch

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Free Couch
A free couch and colorful pillows on the sidewalk in a suburban neighborhood.

Free Couch. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A free couch and colorful pillows on the sidewalk in a suburban neighborhood.

While walking in the neighborhood (which means anything in a radius of about three miles around our home) I often come across things that are… interesting. At this point I can point to homes occupied by hoarders, the best places to look for free garden produce left out for passers-by (which is why we have two loaves of persimmon bread in our freezer), cool house paint, the folks who imagine that putting a fake green carpet when their lawn used to be makes it “beautiful,” the neighborhood full of expensive and gigantic and extremely banal homes, and more.

I also come across quite a bit of suburban detritus. The things that we don’t want any more probably reveal a lot about us — perhaps more than we realize. (It is amazing that someone actually wants some of these things. We’ve had people pick up things like broken rakes…) In a few cases, I suspect that the give-aways may reflect past decisions that the owners eventually realized were, well, not examples of their best aesthetic judgment. Notice those pillows?

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: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

696

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696
Rollup doors on building 696, San Jose.

696. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Rollup doors on building 696, San Jose.

This photograph is a bit of a study in “accidental geometry” that I encountered while on a walk earlier this fall. The two roll-up doors are almost but not quite perfect mirror images, but the surrounding walls are almost opposites, light and dark, and the whole thing is set off by horizontal areas at the top and bottom. There is one little asymmetrical element in the numbers next to the right door — but even there you can find a certain interesting formal pattern if you look for it.

This probably doesn’t seem like my usual subject, but I can assure you it is the sort of thing I see quite often — more often, in fact, than autumn aspens, rugged seashores, deserts, and alpine mountains. It is the terrain of my regular pandemic walks in a circle that extends across a several mile radius from our home. In one direction I often end up passing through light industrial areas, including some that might seem just a bit sketchy. In fact, as I made this photograph I was standing within feet of the temporary pandemic homes of trailer-dwellers parked on the street.

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: Pandemia, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Fence and Gate

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Fence and Gate
A gate in a fence along a trail, photographed on a neighborhood walk.

Fence and Gate. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A gate in a fence along a trail, photographed on a neighborhood walk.

As I have shared in the past, during the pandemic I have cut way back on longer photographic outings, which sadly means less time in places like the Sierra Nevada and similar. (I still go to those places — carefully! — but much less frequently.) On the other hand, initially to compensate but now because it has become habitual, I’m doing a lot of walking in a radius of a few miles around our home. Walks are very close to daily events, and they vary between a couple of miles and up to occasionally as much as eight miles. Among other benefits, these walks open my eyes to local features that I would otherwise overlook. (I have informally referred to the resulting photographs as “postcards from Pandemia.”)

This photo comes from one such recent walk. The subject is simply a gate in a fence along a trail that I probably walk two or three times each week. After months of walking past this, for some reason the gate caught my attention this time. I’ve gone with a black and white rendition here — I’m leaning towards focusing on monochrome for this series now — and a very dark interpretation of the subject. For a long time all of my photographs have tended to try to put more light into the scene. Don’t expect that to stop, however I’m also starting to consider how I can explore images that lean toward darker tones.

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.

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.

Photographs: Pandemia, Photographs: Urban/Street

Green Wall, Autumn Leaves

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Green Wall, Autumn Leaves
Doorway, green wall, roll-up door, a pylon, and autumn leaves at an urban business.

Green Wall, Autumn Leaves. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Doorway, green wall, roll-up door, a pylon, and autumn leaves at an urban business.

This is a photograph I made on one of my long, almost-daily “pandemic walks” that circle out from my neighborhood to include everything from residential neighborhoods to light industrial areas and more. This building is along one of my common routes, and I probably pass by several times per week, usually without paying it much attention.

Scenes like this seem to me to contain more than might be immediately apparent. Objectively it is just a door in the side of a boring concrete industrial warehouse. But a few of the oddities attract me —‚ the brightly colored pylon, the oddly tilting yellow pole with its shadow pointing to the door, various geometries, and that wild green color.

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.