Tag Archives: silhouette

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Imaginary Landscapes, Photographs: Nature

Winter Plants

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Winter Plants
Winter plants growing in a wetland pond, Central Valley, California.

Winter Plants. © Copyright 2023 G Dan Mitchell.

Winter plants growing in a wetland pond, Central Valley, California.

Moving away from the recent large-scale landscape photographs, this one focuses on a small group of plants standing in a shallow Central Valley wetland pond. It is my assumption that the plants grow on dry land, but then this particular area floods in the winter and these simple plants become magical against the smooth background of the water’s surface.

This photograph is not exactly a literal reproduction of the plants’ appearance. Of course, no photograph is exactly equivalent to the complex reality of the subject, but here I went a bit further than usual — though still trying to work within the constraints of believability.

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: Central California, Photographs: Nature

Winter Trees

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Winter Trees
“Winter Trees” — Bare winter trees silhouetted against a cloudy California Central Valley sky.

Over the past decade or so I have come to know these trees well. They are near a turn along a levee road that I often while photographing birds, and they never fail to catch my attention as I pass. In the fall they are still full of colorful leaves, but by January almost all of the leaves are gone. At any time of the year they are likely places to find birds, often hawks or even owls.

This visit was on New Year’s Day, when a group of photographers and friends assembled, as we do every year, to make pictures and celebrate the new year. That celebration made up for the less than ideal light — there were lots of thick clouds, since we were between storms. As I approached the trees this time, the clouds thinned a bit and created backlight that silhouetted the trunks and limbs of the trees.

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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. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email


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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Trail, Winter Haze

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Trail, Winter Haze
A trail winds past oak trees on a hazy winter day.

Trail, Winter Haze. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

A trail winds past oak trees on a hazy winter day.

This is not a place where I typically stop to make landscape photographs. It is along a trail that I often head to when I want to get out for a local hike, and this section of the trail is one that I usually think of as “on the way to other interesting places.” The trail is actually a fire access road, and off to the left and out of the frame there is a ramshackle farm and beyond that a roadway. But the winter atmosphere can make almost anything look better!

The sun was just barely out when I made the photograph on Christmas Eve Day. It was very hazy day of the sort that develops in the Bay Area in the winter when air circulation is poor. In many cases it isn’t exactly an attractive effect. However, when the sun is behind subjects the haze can glow and produce fascinating silhouette effects — and sometimes turn a familiar scene into something quite different.

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

Two Winter Oak Trees

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Two Winter Oak Trees
Two oak trees, on opposite sides of a dormant meadow, with hazy winter light.

Two Winter Oak Trees. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Two oak trees, on opposite sides of a dormant meadow, with hazy winter light.

If you recall another recent oak tree photograph I shared, you might recognize the form of the more distant tree on the right. In that previous photograph my camera position put the sun almost directly behind the tree, thus accentuating the day’s atmospheric haze. For this photograph I moved to a spot from which I could include two trees and highlight the mass of the tree on the left along with its shadow.

I know I’ll be thrilled in a few months when this meadow is again full of tall, green grasses. (And given our recent — and welcome! — California rain, there’s a good chance that the grass will be tall this spring!) But I also love this early winter time, when the air is cool to cold, the trees have lost their leaves, and the meadows have gone dormant.

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.