Tag Archives: state

Photographs: Cascades, Photographs: Nature

Artist Point Meadow, Mount Shuksan

September 1, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 8 Comments

Artist Point and Mt. Shuksan — “Artist Point Meadow, Mount Shuksan” — The view of cloud-shrouded Mount Shuksan from a heather-filled sub-alpine meadow at Artist Point, Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington.

As my brother and I came around the corner of this trail along the side of the Artist Point ridge, it took our breath away. I arrived a moment after he did, and found him already down among the heather flowers near the small run-off creek setting up his tilt-shift lens to make a close-up photograph of the flowers with the mountains in the distance. Once he finished, I went to work on this wider view of the scene, including the nearby foreground meadow and flowers, the trees along the edge of the drop-off, the pool of light in the valley beyond, and the shoulder of cloud-rimmed Mt. Shuksan with a dramatic sky beyond.

On a technical note, this was a very difficult exposure. When I looked down at the flowers and plants I saw what you see here, and when I looked up I saw the cloud-filled sky roughly as it appears in this photograph – but the dynamic range was so wide (ranging from parts of the foreground trees in deep shadow to distant snow fields in direct sun) that one exposure could not capture all of the scene data… so I used three which were then combined in post using masked layers and blended manually.

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: Cascades, Photographs: Nature

Ferns and Rocks, Artist Point

August 31, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 5 Comments

I have (barely) visited parts of the Cascades range of Washington, but it was some years ago and I did not make photographs at the time. This past week I finally had an opportunity to do some real photography in this spectacular mountain range when I accompanied my brother (Richard Mitchell to the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest where we visited Artist Point, a spectacular sub-alpine ridge located between the peaks of Mt. Baker and Mt. Shuksan.

As a long time “Sierra guy” (who has probably spent a total of over two years of his life on the trail in that range) I compare everything to my “home range.” While the Sierra is (are?) in my blood and that isn’t likely to change any time soon, these Washington mountains have (as Washington residents know) a lot to offer. The first thing that I noticed – though you won’t see it in this photograph – is that you quickly get up close and personal with some very large and impressive ice fields and glaciers. In the Sierra we see small glaciers, but they are tame compared to the hulking monsters of the Cascades. As we approached this area and I caught my first view of Shuksan the glaciers were the first thing that I noticed. In addition, you reach sub-alpine and alpine terrain at much lower elevations than in the Sierra. The 5,000’+ area where we photographed felt like a about 10,000′ in the Sierra.

I made this photograph near the end of our visit to Artist Point, in the very late afternoon as the sun dropped and the light began to warm and back-light these plants. These ferns were growing among the rocks of a talus field alongside the trail. There is a little lesson in how this photograph came about. A few hours earlier we had walked past this little area of ferns and rocks and I had paused for some minutes, trying in vain to find a composition there that worked. I knew that there was something about it that was interesting, but I just could not “see” it at that earlier hour. (I’m blaming the light! :-) So we moved on and spend good, productive time photographing in beautiful areas further along the trail. Eventually we realized that we had stayed longer than planned, and that if we were to make it to another site that we had scoped out for golden hour photography we had to high-tail it back down to the parking lot. We loaded up and began the dash down the trail. As I sped past this section, something momentarily caught my attention and brought me up short. Coming back down the trail and now in light that had changed a great deal, I saw photographic potential in the subject that I had not been able to find before – so I stopped and made this photograph.

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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

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others.

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

People Along Manhattan Sidewalk on a Summer Evening

August 30, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

People along the sidewalk along 7th Avenue near Penn Station on a summer evening in New York City.

This is another night photograph made while walking along 7th Avenue around twilight, the time when there is a mixture of dim light still coming from the sky and the garish artificial lights of this urban area. The blue light in this image comes from a nearby blue “marquee” sign that runs along the side of a nearby building and right onto the sidewalk. I was attracted not only by the figures in the scene, but also by the combination of this intense blue light and the “pool” of warmer light that lit the two people.

This and the other photographs made this evening were shot “on the fly” as we walked. In some cases I took the time to raise the camera, compose and shoot – but in others I shot quickly without raising the camera to my eye. This photo is, I believe, in the latter category.

These photographs would have been more difficult to make in the era of film SLRs – not impossible, but certainly challenging. Here I was able to shoot at ISO values between 800 and as high as 3200 and still get decent image quality.

This photograph is 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: New York City, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Sunset on Building With Columns, High Line Park

August 29, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Sunset light illuminates tall columns of the Standard Hotel along the High Line Elevated Park in Chelsea, New York City.

This is another photograph from our Friday evening walk along the High Line Elevated Park in Chelsea. We walked under the Standard Hotel, which straddles the park at this point, just as the warm and saturated pre-sunset light was peaking. Given the quality of the light and the beautiful evening, I was surprised that there were no people on the other side of the plexiglas wall – there were certainly plenty of us enjoying the evening along the walkway of the park.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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