Tag Archives: san jose

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Urban/Street

Red Bench, Ball, and Shadows

June 19, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A weathered red bench next to a suburban lawn and in front of a home with tree shadows

This probably seems like a different sort of photograph from me, but I actually have a thread of images along these lines that goes back quite a ways. They belong to what I think of as “wandering about my neighborhood” photographs, which I make on occasional walks in an extended version of my neighborhood – literally stepping out the front door and then walking. These walks encourage me to see things that I would otherwise miss, both in the general photographic sense of noticing things more when I have a camera in hand and in the more specific sense of noticing things that I otherwise simply pass by in my neighborhood.

I distinctly recall one of the first times I did this. I “saw” two things that I simply had never noticed before, even though I’ve lived in this neighborhood for years. First, in a nearby small downtown area there are buildings with more than one level – and it wasn’t until that first walk that I actually noticed the details of the second stories of these buildings. The second thing I noticed were shadows of trees. It turns out – no surprise now that I think about it – that they are everywhere. It was as if every building had trunks and branches and foliage painted on its walls. This photograph includes these shadows. It also has some other compositional elements that interest me – I’ll leave it to viewers to think about them – and there is something interesting to me about that old, weathered bench and the ball parked next to the column on the patio at the top of the concrete stairs.

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: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Calero Oaks, Fog

April 27, 2013 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

This is an older photograph that I sort of “rediscovered” while going through older files recently. It was due for a bit of additional work, reformatting to fit my current preferred 4:3 print ratio, and the updated web border and text that you see in the online versions of my photographs. (And, to answer the question that comes up from time to time, my fine art prints do not include the text found in the online photographs!)

Although I no longer visit there quite as often, this area became a favorite location of mine a few years ago, especially during the winter months when morning fog frequently burns off and reveals the newly-green winter landscape of the California grassland and oak forests. The photograph was made on one of these very mornings, as I had hiked the familiar trail along the top of this ridge, to find myself on the border between fog in the valleys and clearing on the ridge, with the edge of the fog drifting through these trees and the sun backlighting this misty atmosphere.

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” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him.

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

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Parking Restricted 24 Hours A Day

June 23, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Photograph of a building wall with crack and black windows, sidewalk, and no parking sign.

This is another of those photographs that probably seems intended to perplex and baffle those who like my landscape and nature photography. (If it helps, think of it as an urban landscape.) The photograph was made not far from my home on a midday walk with my camera and a single prime lens. I shot the series from which this comes at what is usually regarded as the worst time of day for photography – close to the noon hour about a week or so before the summer solstice. And I did this on purpose! I think that any light can be good light if it is the light you want to photograph. So the game on this day was to go out and see what I could do with very harsh and bright light.

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Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Textures, Photographs: Urban/Street

Shadows on Parking Lot Wall

June 22, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 1 Comment

Shadows from light fall across a parking lot wall.

A photograph made on a walk with a body and a 50mm lens and not much else – a walk from my home. This wall has often intrigued me, as have these small lamps up near the roof line. On this day I was out in the “terrible light” time of the day – midday, when shadows are almost as close to vertical as they get around here. Not only was I attracted to the interesting slight diagonals of the long shadows, but also to the colors of weathered green paint, deep blue sky, and the messy textures of the parking lot.

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