Tag Archives: sidewalk

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Gate and Harbor

June 13, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Closed gate and shadows at South Beach Harbor, San Francisco

Up early and on the train to San Francisco on a sunny spring morning, I got off at the SF Caltrain Station and began walking along the waterfront. This is familiar territory to me, since “train walks” are a somewhat regular event for me, especially during spring and summer. I get off the train and slowly wander in one or another direction on foot, taking time to look. Sometimes it turns into and out-and-back walk, and sometimes something like a loop. (The latter is what happened on this morning.)

I decided to hear toward the bay, past AT&T Park and then along the waterfront. I angled over toward the South Beach Harbor, mainly because of the luminous and intense light coming across the bay as the fog began to clear — so bright that it was almost impossible to look directly into it. As I passed the harbor this shadow fell across the walkway, so I stepped back and shot straight into its shadow, with the harbor and the bay behind.

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

Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Shadow and Line Study

June 12, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Patterns of lines, curves, concrete and shadows

I have always been intrigued by and occasionally obsessed with patterns and juxtapositions and form. When I go back and look at my earliest photography from when I was in middle school or high school I can now see that even then I wasn’t just looking at things for what they “are,” but for the other things that they might also be — the aspects of them that are not immediately visible. This is simple (or so it seems) study of some lines and curves and perspective lines, made quickly while walking along the Embarcadero on San Francisco’s waterfront one morning.

Recently the discussion about realism and honesty and manipulation in photographs has crescendoed a bit, as it does from time to time. On one side are those who think that anything goes — not exactly my point of view, though I might be more “permissive” that you would expect. On the other side are members the “no manipulation” faction, who want to apply the supposed standards of photojournalism to all photographs — their job is to show truth and be completely objective and no “manipulation” is permitted. The problem with the extremes of the first position are obvious. The problems with the extremes of the second deserve a lot more thoughtful scrutiny then they have generally been receiving. All photographs lie, even those that tell truths. Some might imagine that a photograph like this one represents an objective truth, a straightforward (and straight photography) look at the true nature of a thing. But if you saw this subject, you would not likely see anything like this, and my choices (to make it black and white, to use a particular lens, to render the image in black and white, to look at this particular subset of the whole, and much more) are entirely subjective. In the end, this is still truth — but it is my very subjective truth about this subject and it most certainly is not an objective “record” of a thing.

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

Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

#932 Sale

June 6, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A shop with nighttime visitors, San Francisco

This is another in my series of night street photographs. This photograph comes from an evening in more or less the Chinatown area of San Francisco. This work is a sort of counterpoint to my landscape and nature photography. Although the two seem quite different, I think that each type of photography makes me better at the other. This work happens very quickly, usually without a whole lot of time to contemplate — so it exercises the fast and intuitive part of my seeing.

The photographs tend to occur in two ways. In some cases I simply see something happening and I have to photograph it immediately without a lot of time for conscious thought — if I wait the opportunity will be gone. Another sort of work has a stronger connection to landscape, and I think of these photographs as being a sort of urban landscape. As was the case with this photograph, I find a particular subject or composition and then I watch for figures to occupy the space in interesting ways. The interest can come from their relative positions, their posture and the direction they look, how they fit into the available lighting, and the color of their attire. And, as I have pointed out previously, this nighttime handheld street photography is something that only became reasonably possible very recently, with the development of small cameras that will work at very high ISO settings.

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Reclining Man, San Francisco Bay

June 2, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A man rests along the shoreline of San Francisco Bay

It is usually not my habit to photograph the down and out, homeless people, and other photographic clichés — I often (though not quite always) feel that such photography can be too easy, can create a false impression of concern and engagement, and that the invasion of the subject’s privacy may raise some ethical questions that concern me. But like most rules, there are exceptions, and this subject seemed to be one for me.

There was something about this man, reclining quietly in the sun along this popular stretch of San Francisco’s scenic waterfront that has, looked at it certain ways, a kind of nobility. Something about him and his location and pose reminds me of certain Renaissance paintings. And, frankly, his appearance seems to me to coalesce and possibly completely change what would otherwise simply be another scenic San Francisco urban landscape photograph.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: sidewalk

Gate and Harbor

Shadow and Line Study

#932 Sale

Reclining Man, San Francisco Bay

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