Tag Archives: sierra

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Eastern Sierra Aspens

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Eastern Sierra Aspens
Late-season Eastern-Sierra aspens in green, yellow, and orange.

Eastern Sierra Aspens. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Late-season Eastern-Sierra aspens in green, yellow, and orange

With this post I interrupt the recent stream of New England fall color photographs to bring you fall color from California’s Eastern Sierra. Our productive trip to photograph the beautiful fall color in (mostly) New Hampshire cut into the time I would usually spend in the Sierra during the aspen color season, but I wasn’t about to miss it entirely. So I managed a four-day trip to the “East Side” last week, visiting several promising aspen color locations. As a result, I’ll eventually have a bit more to say about two subjects: a comparison between the East and West Coast experiences, and the prospects of finding Sierra color after the middle of October.

As I post this year’s Sierra aspen photographs, you’ll probably notice that I made many of them in soft light: near dawn or dusk, in the shadow of nearby mountains, or under some degree of cloudiness. Despite my love of backlit trees, this is my favorite kind o light for photographing the fall colors. To me the colors seem richer, and I can maintain more shadow detail than I typically get in the harsher direct sunlight. I made this photograph late in the day on the east side of the range, shortly after the sun had dropped behind the Sierra crest.

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: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Outlet, Morning

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Outlet, Morning
Morning light shines on the formations of a canyon containing the outlet stream of an alpine lake.

Outlet, Morning. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Morning light shines on the formations of a canyon containing the outlet stream of an alpine lake.

Don’t hold me to this… but this may be the final photograph in the series from the August Eastern Sierra backcountry trip. A group of us entered the wilderness, set up a base camp, and photographed the area for a week. The group included Michael Frye, Claudia Welsh, Franka Gabler, David Hoffman, Jerry Bosworth, Patty Mitchell, and me — a fine group of colleagues and friends with whom to spend the week! We survived a torrential rain storm on our first day or two, then explored the area around our camp and on up into the high, alpine country nearby.

If you have been following my posts from the trip, this subject perhaps seems familiar by now. The outlet stream from the lake where we camped empties suddenly into a fairly narrow and rugged canyon that descends to a larger valley beyond. The morning light here was often quite beautiful, coming from beyond and somewhat to the right. On this morning a bit of haze, likely from wildfires, glowed in the backlight and slightly muted the details of more distant features.

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: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Clearing Storm Clouds

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Clearing Storm Clouds
Blue sky appears as storm clouds dissipate above the Eastern Sierra Nevada.

Clearing Storm Clouds. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Blue sky appears as storm clouds dissipate above the Eastern Sierra Nevada.

Perhaps the most interesting skies are associated with transitions from one kind of weather to another. This includes not only the arrival of storms but also their departure. If the storm has been large and long, the first hints of its passage bring a feeling of home and light. Thinner areas appear in the cloud cover, in some places the sky becomes more blue than gray, perhaps a bit of sunlight shines through. The storm usually doesn’t depart all at once — more likely in fits and starts as lingering clouds move in and out.

After more than 24 hours of mostly rain, some of it heavy, the clearing finally began in the very late afternoon of the second day of our Sierra backcountry visit. At first we mostly just noticed that the rain had stopped, even though the clouds were thick and gray. We left our tents and wandered out to overlooks, hoping to make some photographs. Gradually the clouds rose higher, and gaps began to appear. Soon a bit of light came over the ridge to our west and the clouds over the lowlands to the east began to break up, revealing blue 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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

Blog | About | Twitter | 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: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

An Alpine Bowl

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An Alpine Bowl
Rock-filled meadows rise past the tree line towards the rugged terrain of the alpine zone, Eastern Sierra Nevada.

An Alpine Bowl. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Rock-filled meadows rise past the tree line towards the rugged terrain of the alpine zone, Eastern Sierra Nevada.

This particular corner of the Sierra Nevada backcountry landscape became a bit of an obsession for me during out August backcountry photography foray. We camped nearby for a week, and every day we went out to explore and photograph portions of the surrounding alpine landscape. Our base camp was not far below the high country of open meadows and talus, which is my favorite kind of Sierra landscape.

With that in mind, it should probably be no surprise that I walked up into the area in this photograph several times. Access was quite close — a few hundred yards above our camp, after crossing a creek, I was in the lower reaches of the sub-alpine meadow, and from there it was a pleasant amble across the meadows, occasionally through some trees, and on up to the treelike and beyond. High in this bowl I found what I expected — a shallow lake replenished by snowmelt water coming down from high above.

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 | Twitter | 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. (Click this post’s title first if you are viewing on the home page.)

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