Tag Archives: spray

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Mist, Trees, and Boulders – Cascade Creek

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Mist, Trees, and Boulders - Cascade Creek
Mist, Trees, and Boulders - Cascade Creek

Mist, Trees, and Boulders – Cascade Creek. Yosemite National Park, California. June 18, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Mist and spray from spring runoff fill the air in the boulder-strewn canyon of Cascade Creek, Yosemite National Park.

Making this photograph was an “interesting” experience! I visited Cascade Creek on June 18, probably near the peak flow of the spring runoff season, and the creek was a full-blown torrent. After photographing some familiar rock formations below the bridge that crosses the creek, I decided to try a photograph from the upstream side of the bridge. In this direction, the creek is more or less half waterfall and half cascade as it plunges down a very steep and narrow section of the hillside. The whole scene was in deep shade and mist and spray filled the air.

I made a guess that a 135mm lens might give me a tight enough framing of the scene, so I briefly stepped away from the creek and the spray-filled air to switch lenses. Leaving everything else behind, I took the camera, tripod, and this single prime lens and walked to the wet side of the bridge. There was enough spray that I and my gear began to get wet pretty fast, so I worked quickly. I got everything in what I figured would be about the right position before I uncovered the lens, then quickly uncovered and finalized the composition and manually focused. I knew that I couldn’t really stay in this spray all that long so I spent a couple minutes bracketing a series of exposures as the mist surrounded me, hoping that water on the lens and in the air in front of the camera would not interfere with the shot.

The main decision was about shutter speed and with other decisions regarding aperture and so forth to follow on that. The idea was to use a slow enough shutter speed to allow the water to blur a bit, but not so slow as to turn it to formless mist. I managed to get to a 1/5 second exposure by shooting at f/20, an aperture a bit smaller than I would typically want to use, as apertures smaller than about f/16 can begin to introduce a bit too much diffraction blur. But in a shot like this one where mist is obscuring a great deal of the detail anyway, that seemed like a reasonable compromise that let me lengthen the shutter speed just a bit.

G Dan Mitchell Photography
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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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Boulders, Cascade Creek

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Boulders, Cascade Creek
Boulders, Cascade Creek

Boulders, Cascade Creek. Yosemite National Park, California. June 18, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Granite boulders deflect the turbulent flow of Cascade Creek as it descends to the Merced River, Yosemite National Park.

This photograph is another in my continuing study of the boulders and flowing water of Yosemite’s Cascade Creek. I made this photograph fairly early in the morning on the weekend when Tioga Pass opened this year. I arrived before the scheduled 8:00 a.m. opening of Tioga Pass Road and decided that it would be more interesting and useful to photograph this subject than to wait in line so that I could be on my way over the pass at exactly the moment the road opened, especially when the morning brings shaded, diffused light to this cascade.

As I repeatedly photograph this subject, I begin to know it much more thoroughly. Partly it is a matter of understanding the seasonal and even daily ebb and flow of water and light at this place, but it is also a process of becoming very familiar with smaller details of the scene. When I first photographed here this rock outcropping was something that I occasionally worked to minimize in some compositions, but it has since come to be an interesting subject on its own. It extends into the torrent, forcing the water to flow around (and partially over, in high water) before dropping steeply to the right, running into other rocks, and making a quick and turbulent left turn before heading over another drop. Because it sits in the middle of all of this wild water, it is often covered with water and this water reflects the light of the open sky beyond the shaded confines of this narrow canyon.

G Dan Mitchell Photography
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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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Impossible Tree Falls

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Impossible Tree Falls
Impossible Tree Falls

Impossible Tree Falls. Yosemite National Park, California. June 19, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

“Impossible Tree Falls” in full early season flow, fed by the runoff from a very heavy snowpack, Yosemite National Park.

I don’t know if this is really called Impossible Tree Falls, but I like the name and I’m going with it. My guess is that the reason for the name might be two-fold. First, the tree does grow right in the middle of this roadside water fall. It must be an interesting few weeks each spring when this tree wakes up to find itself in the middle of a raging water fall, since the rest of the year things are much calmer. Second, the trees seems to grow on nothing but bare rock. It is hard to see in this mist-covered and back-lit image, but it looks like the tree is rooted in solid rock.

For a person who likes to occasionally think of himself as something of a back-country photographer, it is almost embarrassing to admit that this waterfall is right next to Tioga Pass Road. I’ll be honest – I parked my car in a pull-out on the opposite side of the roadway and probably never moved more than 10 yards from there. To add insult to injury, at a couple of points I had to stop shooting while passing recreational vehicles interfered with the view! ;-)

But none of that makes the tumultuous little waterfall any less impressive. It appears above the road, where it seems to come out of a flatter forest area, and then it abruptly tumbles down a very steep rocky incline, twisting and turning around boulders – and one solitary tree.

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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: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Spring Cascade, Tioga Pass Road

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Spring Cascade, Tioga Pass Road
Spring Cascade, Tioga Pass Road

Spring Cascade, Tioga Pass Road. Yosemite National Park, California. June 18, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A seasonal stream cascades over a granite ledge along Tioga Pass Road, Yosemite National Park.

This small cascade is one of hundreds seen along Tioga Pass Road on June 18 this year, the day the park service opened the road for the season. The opening date was later than usual due to the heavy snowpack, and there was water everywhere as the snow melt accelerated in the late spring weather. It was almost embarrassingly easy to find and photograph these subjects – this one was right next to the roadway.

This is part of a larger cascade, out of view to the right, that flows off the top of a granite area and drops quickly across granite cliffs. Here the water strikes a slanting ledge and bits of spray explode almost like Fourth of July fireworks. Obviously, the somewhat unusually long shutter speed was selected with this effect in mind. The reddish plants to the left, just beginning to come back to life after the long winter, hint at the early date in the season.

G Dan Mitchell Photography | Flickr | Twitter (follow me) | Facebook (“Like” my page) | 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.