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Morning, St. Mark’s Square

Morning, St. Mark's Square
“Morning, St. Mark’s Square” — A few people and many pigeons, early morning at St. Mark’s Square, Venice

St. Mark’s Square can be one of the most crowded places in Venice. The square itself is one of the best known landmarks, and others (like the eponymous cathedral) are nearby, along with the famous columns and the waterfront. If you are looking to avoid the crowds, this is not one of the places you most likely go!

However, on this morning I was out on the streets very early with my camera. I began a bit before sunrise, actually. Not only were there far fewer people, but the early morning air was comfortably cool. It felt like a very different Venice as a few people walked past and flocks of pigeons collected in the square.


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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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Windows, Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great

Windows, Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great
Afternoon light enters through windows at the Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great, London

Windows, Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great. © Copyright 2021 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Afternoon light enters through windows at the Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great, London

This photograph comes from the Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great (what a wonderful name!) in London, photographed on a visit there way back in 2013. As we often do when traveling in places like this, we came upon this subject essentially by accident. We were walking in the vicinity because we had come to look at something else, paused to eat lunch in a pub, then headed outside with no particular goal in mind, saw an interesting doorway down a street, and went in. “Discovering” things by accident seems to be a theme of my approach to travel.

There are a few other things connected to this photograph. First, it is (obvious from the date of the exposure) another of the lost-but-found photographs uncovered from my old raw files as I work my way through them as a pandemic project. Because of a project that some folks are working on, it is also one that features glass as a subject. Finally, the process of working through the old files has reminded me again that “making” a photograph is very much not an act of clicking shutter buttons. It begins with seeing, then to “capture,” but what happens between that and the existence of a final photograph can be a very long and convoluted process.


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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Tasty Hand-Pulled Noodles

Tasty Hand-Pulled Noodles
Man in vest and helmet emerges from Tasty Hand-Pulled Noodles, Inc.

Tasty Hand-Pulled Noodles. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Man in vest and helmet emerges from Tasty Hand-Pulled Noodles, Inc.

This is another quite street photography photograph made in Manhattan, almost certainly along the edges of its Chinatown district. On the scale from instant and intuitive to slow and methodical, this photograph fits in the former category. I think I recall stopping for no longer than a few seconds to photograph this place, and timing a couple of the exposures to include this fellow coming out through the door. Once he was out of the picture my interest waned and we moved on.

Of course the name of the business caught my attention — not just “Noodles” or that word plus someone’s name, but “Tasty, hand-pulled noodles, Inc.”, and on a shop that wasn’t, well, very pretentious. The fellow coming out the door was wearing one of those bright orange reflective vests and a bicycle helmet. I saw no bicycle nearby, but perhaps he was a messenger. Not clear from the photograph, unless you notice how much clothing he is wearing, is that he was apparently out on a bicycle on a day when the temperature barely reached twenty degrees and the wind was blowing strongly.


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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Saint Paul’s Cathedral, Night

Saint Paul's Cathedral, Night
Pedestrians along a walkway leading toward Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London

Saint Paul’s Cathedral, Night. London, England. July 5, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Pedestrians along a walkway leading toward Saint Paul’s Cathedral, London

St. Paul’s Cathedral is an obvious landmark at any time, but at night it is even more so, especially if you approach it from across the River Thames by way of the Millennium Bridge. We visited the bank opposite the cathedral on several evenings, so I can no longer remember precisely what we had been there for on this evening — The Old Globe Theater, meeting up with relatives for dinner, a visit to the Tate Modern? I’m not certain.

In any case, we ended up crossing the river in this direction after dark on a warm summer evening when many people were out strolling around. This was one of the first times when I realized that my little mirrorless camera was good enough in low light that I could actually do handheld night photography.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | FacebookGoogle+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email


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