Tag Archives: shadows

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

Power Plant Wall, Night

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Power Plant Wall, Night
Power Plant Wall, Night

Power Plant Wall, Night. Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, Vallejo, California. April 16, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Night photograph of the exterior wall of the power plant at Mare Island Naval Ship Yard.

I have wandered past this building on many previous night photography sessions at Mare Island and have photographed quite a bit nearby, but this is the first time I have photographed it, at least from this perspective. (The iconic power plant smokestack above this building has been a subject of mine in the past.) The first thing that caught my interest about this building is that wonderful bundle of pipes that emerges near the upper left area and then heads off to who-knows-where in both directions. As I looked at the side of the building and imagined what it would look like in a long exposure under this artificial light, the rectangular shapes of the painted sections of the concrete wall seemed like they might also be interesting. And only after I made the photograph and looked at it in post did I realize that there was enough light in the scene – and perhaps inside the building – to faintly light some parts of the interior seen through the windows. The many shadows coming from different directions are produced by multiple overlapping light sources nearby.

To give you an idea of how dark it was on the scene, there was not enough light to focus. Usually I can get just enough by using the live view feature on my camera and finding an edge or a reflection somewhere that provides a line that has enough light, but not here. I finally ended up using one of the standard night photography tricks: I took a very small pocket LED light, walked over and set it against the wall, walked back to my camera to focus on this point of light, returned to the wall to retrieve the light, walked back to the camera and made my exposure.

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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

Manly Beacon, First Light

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Manly Beacon, First Light
Manly Beacon, First Light

Manly Beacon, First Light. Death Valley National Park, California. March 30, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The first morning light strikes Manly Beacon at Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park.

Icon alert!

I had more or less promised myself that I would not photograph at Zabriskie Point on this trip – been there, done that – unless the conditions were really special. But I miscalculated my morning start on this day and discovered that I wasn’t going to make it to my intended destination in time. As I passed Zabriskie on my way to the “other place,” telling myself that I still had a half hour before I needed to be in place for the early light… I noticed that clouds above this area were already starting to pick up the pink color of dawn light. I hesitated for a moment – I really wanted to photograph that other subject – but quickly realized that it would make a lot more sense to the shoot the subject that was here in the light that was developing than to drive further and miss out entirely on the first light.

So I turned into that familiar parking lot with its familiar fleet of photographers’ cars and quickly loaded up my gear. I was a bit surprised that I saw so few people up above at the official overlook, but it was quite windy and I figured that perhaps they had just dropped down on the other side of the wall below this spot. In any case, I had a different spot in mind, one further to the right, so I headed over that way and quickly discovered that the wind was blowing almost too strongly to make photographs. I made a couple of shots from a small gap there and then headed up toward the overlook. At the top of the little trail from the parking lot I dropped onto the small use trail to the side of the wall and was again surprised to see almost no other photographers. I walked a few feet farther and discovered that the “usual crowd” was huddled in a small area in the lee of the wall, trying desperately to find protection from the wind.

These days, my main project when I stop at Zabriskie is to find and photograph small, isolated elements of the landscape with a long lens. For the most part – unless truly magical conditions are present, and they weren’t on this morning – I don’t really spend much time on the classic views of Gower Gulch, the Valley, and the Panamint Range. However, since I’m there and know the progression of the light fairly well at this point, I’m not about to pass up the opportunity to get a better image of one of these iconic subjects. So as the first light was about to hit the summit of Manly Beacon I turned my rig that direction and spent a couple of minutes photographing it as the line between shadow and morning light traveled down its face.

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

Wooden Building and Stairs in Moonlight

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Wooden Building and Stairs in Moonlight
Wooden Building and Stairs in Moonlight

Wooden Building and Stairs in Moonlight. Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, Vallejo, California. April 16, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The light of the full moon illuminates the facade of a wooden building, and outside stairway, and passing overhead fog clouds at Mare Island Naval Ship Yard.

Since I was out doing night photography this weekend, I’m going to use this as an excuse to insert a night image into the recent stream of Death Valley photographs. (There are more of those, but a bit of variety can’t hurt.) I got an email from Tim Baskerville, the guiding light (guiding dark?) of The Nocturnes, the San Francisco Bay Area night photography group. Tim has introduced and guided many new night photographers over the past few decades, and The Nocturnes group is a sort of loose collective linking together lots of night photographers and providing instruction, online resources, and shows of night photography work. As this is the 20th year for the group, lots of special activities are taking place and this little spontaneous get-together at Mare Island was one of them.

A small story from this weekend’s shoot may illustrate the widespread effect of Tim’s work with night photography in general and with the Mare Island location specifically. Those of us who were to meet Tim at Mare Island arrived to find other photographers already assembled at the indicated meeting place – but we didn’t really recognize most of the group. It turns out that another night photography group (loosely organized, as I understand it, by Thomas Hawk and Ivan Makarov) was going to be there as well. We spoke with them a bit and then they departed for the far end of the island. (They returned later and we worked side by side.) But then, a few minutes later, more vehicles began to show up and we thought that they might be the rest of our group, especially when someone asked “Are you the Nocturnes?” But no, this was a third night photography group, this one out of Sacramento!

In any case, as the light diminished and night came on we started shooting. We had a nearly full moon, which can be a wonderful asset, not so much as a subject (it is very difficult to include the full moon in night shots) but for the beautiful light is sheds on other subjects that might otherwise be very dark. On top of that, we had a combination of some high clouds (which are relatively stationary) and low fog (which creates a nice luminous glow as it quickly passes). I decided to begin the evening’s work by photographing this wooden-sided building and its outside staircase, illuminated by the moonlight, and with a bit of the cloudy sky and faint star trails.

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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

Trail Canyon, Lower Slopes of Wildrose Peak, Death Valley

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Trail Canyon, Lower Slopes of Wildrose Peak, Death Valley
Trail Canyon, Lower Slopes of Wildrose Peak, Death Valley

Trail Canyon, Lower Slopes of Wildrose Peak. Death Valley National Park, California. March 30, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Afternoon shadows fall across the lower slopes of Wildrose Peak above Trail Canyon and below Aguereberry Point, with Death Valley and the Black Mountains beyond.

The view from Aguereberry Point (and from this location close to the point) is spectacular and expansive, taking in everything from Death Valley itself, stretching almost 180 degrees from left to right, to the Green, Black, and other mountains beyond. To the south and north other ranges merge with the atmospheric haze. The peaks of the Panamint range lie behind, and in places where the view is clear you can look down on the rugged terrain of the east face of the Panamint Range with its rugged ridges and deep canyons dropping towards the Valley. This photograph looks roughly southeast towards the lower end of Death Valley in the area around Ashford Mill. The deep foreground canyon, the bottom of which is just visible at lower right, is Trail Canyon. I understand that a four-wheel-drive road used to come up to Aguereberry Point via that canyon, but that parts have washed out and it can no longer be driven. I think that you can hike it, but that would be one heck of a climb since the base of the canyon can’t be more than a few hundred feet above Death Valley (which is below sea level in this area) and the Point is well above 6000′. The lower slopes of Wildrose Peak rise beyond the canyon.

Surprisingly, this view presents several photographic challenges. Because of the haze that appears when such great distances are part of the scene, I chose to use a polarizing filter for this shot. Timing is important here, too. Arrive a bit too early and the light is harsh and flat. Arrive a bit too late and the foreground ridges are quickly enveloped in shadows as the sun drops behind the crest of the Panamint Range. (Yes, I have made both mistakes in the past.) Knowing this, I arrived a bit earlier than I might have usually arrive to shoot evening light and I managed to photograph the scene before that Panamint Range shadow obliterated the foreground light.

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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.