Tag Archives: signs

Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Service Station, Billboards

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Service Station, Billboards
Billboards tower over a service station in morning light, San Francisco

Service Station, Billboards. San Francisco, California. August 14, 2015. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Billboards tower over a service station in morning light, San Francisco

There are many kinds of landscapes to photograph, and I like most of them. This one happens to be an urban landscape, a subject that I like a lot. I made the photograph on one of my periodic walks through parts of San Francisco. This one, as most of them do, started at the Caltrain station very early in the morning and headed straight up toward Market Street. This gas station is right near a freeway interchange, and probably ideally situated for people arriving in or departing from downtown San Francisco.

I know that a scene like this may simply baffle some viewers, especially those who are more drawn to nature and natural landscape photographs with their depictions of unspoiled beauty. I understand. But even in the city there is beauty, and the light was especially wonderful on this morning — blue sky with scattered fog breaking up created a soft but still directional quality to the muted light. My eyes first went to the billboards, whose backsides here tower above the surrounding buildings — urban mountains or cliffs, perhaps? But alone they did not seem to make a photograph. But then I saw the light on that wall with the “PRINTING” sign, and the contrast between the blues of the sky and wall and the hot reds and yellows of the corporate colors on the gas station.

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.
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Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Chinatown Street

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Chinatown Street
Chinatown Street

Chinatown Street. New York City. August 10, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A narrow, empty street curves past small shops in New York City’s Chinatown

First off, I’m obviously not a “real” New Yorker — I love the place, but I’m most certainly a visitor and a west coast guy at heart. However, that means that for me many things that might seem familiar and perhaps even ordinary to long time New Yorkers are still special and new. My first visit to New York’s Chinatown area was only a few years ago. We came into the city on Christmas Eve and pretty much the only restaurants open nearby (we were staying on Canal Street) were in Chinatown, so we plunged into the throngs that typically seem to crowd the sidewalks here, eventually wandered down some narrow streets, and arrived at a restaurant where we met up with friends and family members for a wonderful dinner.

This time we got there a bit later during our trip, on an evening when we were all perhaps becoming just a bit travel-tired and when we wanted a dinner that wasn’t quite so expensive as some others we had recently enjoyed. One or both of our sons suggested that we meet up at a place in Chinatown again, and since we arrived a bit early I took advantage of the situation and made a few photographs on this wonderful little street, with its beautiful curve, small shops, and wildly colorful store fronts and signs. Most of the time this street was busy with passing pedestrians, but I waited a bit and managed to make this photograph of the empty street in the evening light. The details of such photographs are often fun and intriguing — the picture on the hair salon sign at the left, the bicycle sitting on its rear wheel at the far right, the colorful flags on one store front, and more.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: People, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

America’s Pastime

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America's Pastime - Baseball fans along the outer walkways of San Francisco Giants' AT&T Park, with scoreboard, commercial messages, and twilight sky.

America’s Pastime. San Francisco, California. May 26, 2009. © Copyright 2009 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Baseball fans along the outer walkways of San Francisco Giants’ AT&T Park, with scoreboard, commercial messages, and twilight sky.

This photograph comes from a couple of years ago, and is one that I “found” again recently during a scan though a half dozen or so years worth of old files. I tend to be rather cautious about deleting old files, but I finally decided that some of the older files really not worth keeping – and the side benefit of cleaning out some of the photographic cobwebs is that I often rediscover photographs that I had forgotten.

We go to a few San Francisco Giants games every season. While I like the baseball, other things also draw my attention. In addition to the garlic fries and beer (!), AT&T Park also provides a lot of interesting photographic opportunities. At some point during every game I tend to just wander around the facility and see what might make an interesting photograph. Most often I use the elevated vantage points around the park to photograph San Francisco and the Bay, but sometimes I also photograph subjects within the stadium, too.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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

Metal Walled Building With Door, Tree and Lawn, Night

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Metal Walled Building With Door, Tree and Lawn, Night
Metal Walled Building With Door, Tree and Lawn, Night

Metal Walled Building With Door, Tree and Lawn, Night. Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, California. February 26, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Night photograph of a metal walled building with a door, sidewalk, lawn, and tree – Mare Island Naval Ship Yard.

This is a bit of a different sort of night photograph compared to the others I have posted in this recent series. (Most of those were shot at some distance from my subjects – generally old, historic buildings – and in very saturated and colorful light.) Near the end of my evening shoot at Mare Island in late February I was walking back from a dark and lonely corner of the place when I passed a more modern facility, an out-patient clinic of some sort. This facility is something of a stark contrast to the surrounding area. The building is relatively new and the walls are not the usual brick and/or corrugated metal, but instead are a more modern-looking sort of metal paneling. There is landscaping, including small patches of lawn and small trees. And the light is completely different. Elsewhere in the darker areas of Mare Island the lighting tends toward yellow, coming from sodium vapor lamps, though it also includes green and occasionally other hues. But here the light is fairly neutral and actually looks almost white. I wasn’t quite sure what to do! :-)

But then it seemed to me that it might be interesting to see what I could do with this modern (though not flawless) structure and its surrounding landscaping. Here a small door, partly blocked by some sort of signs, leads into a very small section of a building and is lit a bit mysteriously from above. Sidewalks lead away from the door and a small, forlorn patch of lawn sits near the corner of the building, with a single leafless tree supported by stakes. When I saw this spot and when I look at the photograph now I get this feeling that there should be some story behind all of this… but I have no idea what it might be.

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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.