Tag Archives: skeleton

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature

Old Tree, Sunrise

Image February 14, 2024 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Once again the weather reports predicted tule fog in the Central Valley, so I was up and on the road early. My hope was that I’d find more geese and cranes to photograph this time — there weren’t as many as I expected on my previous visit. At the same time, I knew that the wet conditions might diminish their numbers. It turned that this was the case, and there were almost none of the birds I came for in the morning. But there was fog!

It was almost a perfect foggy morning. Most of the drive was in clear air, but I hit heavy fog perhaps ten minutes from my destination, so thick that photography was initially a challenge. I photographed this tree later as the fog thinned. It still was around, but so close to the ground that the blue sky was visible above this sprawling old tree as the sun rose beyond.

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: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Bleached Plant, Sandstone, Shadows

March 19, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The skeleton of a bleached plant casts shadows across a sandstone slab

In the fall I spent some time making photographs in Utah, getting to a good number of locations, including some I returned to for more photography following previous visits. Partway through this trip I had plans to rendezvous with a group of friends (some new and some old) and photographers in a somewhat remote part of the state. We met, headed out, and spent the next few days camped “out there,” making photographs every day and visiting some very beautiful places.

On the first day of my meeting with this group we found a place to camp and began to settle in. That process took place pretty quickly, as all of us have spent a lot of time camping and we don’t need a lot of luxuries — in addition to friends we need food, a campfire, a place to sleep, and a spot by the fire for our chairs. So I soon found myself with a few hours of late afternoon free time between the camp chores and our evening shoot. I wandered off into nearby hills and eventually ended up on a sandstone bench with a bit of a view of the surrounding terrain. On top of this flat, dry, and nearly lifeless spot there were several plants that had tried to make a living here, setting down roots in tiny pockets of sandy soil and then growing horizontally across the rock. The first thing that attracted me was the stark contrast between the bleached plant and the red rock sandstone, but (as is always the case) the more I looked the more I saw. The curve of the white branch at the right edge of the frame is echoed by the similar upward curve of the eroded bit of darker rock on the left side, and a darker parallel version of the plant falls on the rock in the form of a shadow.

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: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects

Abandoned Control Tower, Hangar One

September 29, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

An abandoned control tower in front of the skeleton of historic Hangar One, stripped of its outer skin, at the NASA/Ames Research Center Moffett Airfield.

Moffett Field (now officially called “Moffett Federal Airfield”) is an iconic landmark in the southern San Francisco Bay Area. Located along highway 101, in sight of thousands of drivers who pass every day, the most obvious features are the three very large hangars that were once built to house lighter-than-air craft. The largest is the so-called “Hangar One,” which is shown in this photograph. When I was a child, my family used to go to Moffett Field (then “Moffett Naval Air Station,” if I recall correctly) on “Armed Forces Day” (which seemed to be a big deal back then) to see the annual air shows, often featuring the Blue Angels and more. Visiting Hangar One was always a high point. The thing is huge! The wikipedia entry reports, among other things, that it is large enough to hold six football fields.

In the 1990s the airfield was decommissioned and then turned over the NASA Ames Research Center. Not long after that it was discovered that the lead paint used in the structure and perhaps other elements, too, were polluting the waters of the San Francisco Bay, which lie at the end of the runway. To make a long story short, the steel panels that formed the outer shell of the hangar were stripped off as part of the work to fix this problem. I’m unaware of the ultimate plan, if there is one, for the hangar, though its historic status creates some hope that it might be refitted at some point. I made this photograph on September 21, 2012 while waiting for the flyover of the Endeavor on its flight to Los Angeles. Even without the skin, the massive skeletal structure is quite a sight.

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Remains of a Desert Plant, Pebbles

March 9, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The skeletal branches of a dead plant against the pebbles of a desert wash, Death Valley National Park, California.

I came across the skeletal remains of this desert plant while photographing along the east side of Death Valley near the area identified on some maps as the Kit Fox Hills. I had just finished photographing across the floor of the Valley, capturing an area full of sparse desert plants backlit by the very last rays of sun, and the light had diminished after the sun dropped below the tops of the ridges on the west side of the Valley.

I saw this bit of dead plant near the edge of a wash among the rubble of many-colored rocks and pebbles that had, I presume, been washed down from the canyons in the mountains to the east. For a place that seems so colorless from a distance, there is an astonishing variety of color in these rocks. I can see greens, blues, various shades of pink and purple, and some that almost are orange. The branches are just as I found them, and the soft light with just a bit of directionality from the right fills the shadows that would otherwise be very dark.

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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.

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