Tag Archives: steep

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Point Arena Lighthouse

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Point Arena Lighthouse - The Point Arena Lighthouse stands atop rugged coastal bluffs along the northern California coast.
The Point Arena Lighthouse stands atop rugged coastal bluffs along the northern California coast.

Point Arena Lighthouse. Northern California. August 29, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The Point Arena Lighthouse stands atop rugged coastal bluffs along the northern California coast.

I have only visited the Point Arena Lighthouse one other time. This is symptomatic of the fact that I have overlooked the far northern coast of California. I suppose I’ve been too busy with the Sierra and other areas in this state full of visual riches, but since “discovering” the northern coastal areas I have become much more interested in photographing there.

This visit was during the middle of the day and the sky was almost completely clear – not exactly stirring conditions for photographing such a scene. So I spent some time looking at locations and angles and possible composition, at least partly with an eye to returning yet again but during a time of more interesting lighting – this location might be spectacular in the right late day light, and dawn isn’t out of the question.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Detail, Face of The Watchman, Sunset

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Detail, Face of The Watchman, Sunset - The last sunset light on a portion of the face of The Watchman, Zion National Park, Utah.
The last sunset light on a portion of the face of The Watchman, Zion National Park, Utah.

Detail, Face of The Watchman, Sunset. Zion National Park, Utah. April 4, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The last sunset light on a portion of the face of The Watchman, Zion National Park, Utah.

As this evening approached, I had a plan to be somewhere close to the Zion National Park visitor center above Springdale, where I had seen the nearly full moon rising behind the ridge near The Watchman before sunset the night before. With that timing of the moon in mind, I estimated that on this night, the moon might rise in roughly the same spot but just a bit later. In many ways, the prime time for doing photographs of the full moon is during the golden hour, when there is sufficient ambient light to permit the correct exposure for the moon. But there is no moon in this photograph – so you might wonder what the point is!

I did show up here to photograph the moon, and I did get some photographs of the moon rising over the ridge. But after making a few moon photographs, I began to scan my surroundings a bit more closely, and I saw that the line between the sunset glow and the deeper post-sunset shadows was slowly working its way up the face of the Watchman. So as light/shadow demarcation slowly moved up the face of the cliff below the summit of the Walkman Watchman (!), I turned my camera that direction and made a few exposures of the rugged rocky face as it was lit by the last light of the setting sun.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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 Torrent, Yosemite

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Spring Torrent, Yosemite - A cascading creek zigzags among boulders as it descends a steep mountainside, Yosemite National Park.
A cascading creek zigzags among boulders as it descends a steep mountainside, Yosemite National Park.

Spring Torrent, Yosemite. Yosemite National Park, California. June 18, 2011. © Copyright 2011 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A cascading creek zigzags among boulders as it descends a steep mountainside, Yosemite National Park.

This is a scene I have photographed many times, as I continue to work on “seeing” and understanding its elements. (And as I work on trying not to duplicate other beautiful “takes” on this location that have been produced by other photographers whose work I respect a great deal!) As a matter of fact, the “many times” would have to include the many times I photographed it on this particular visit, as photographing moving water tends to be a bit of a game of percentages. While you can start to gauge some of the patterns of the water if you watch long and intently enough, in the end you have to take what you get to some extent. Fortunately, with digital cameras it is possible to improve the odds a bit since one can make a lot of exposures, with the only real cost being the great amount of time required to go through them all.

This photograph was made at just about the peak of the spring runoff season, and during a year that had featured well above average precipitation during the previous winter. In mid-June (about the time that Tioga Pass finally opened) there was water flowing everywhere – obviously in the many well-known creeks and rivers and waterfalls, but also in places where you might otherwise not expect to see flowing water. Impromptu seasonal streams were everywhere, flowing across granite and through forests and often spilling right across the roadways. The object in this photograph was to try to shoot straight into the maelstrom of the current as it dropped down a steep hillside, twisting and turning as it passed through a narrow, rocky area.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | 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.

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast, Photographs: Structures and Objects

Bixby Bridge, Pacific Coast Highway

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Bixby Bridge, Pacific Coast Highway
Black and white photograph of the Pacific Coast Highway crossing Bixby Bridge above the rugged Big Sur coastline of California.

Bixby Bridge, Pacific Coast Highway. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

The Pacific Coast Highway crossing Bixby Bridge above the rugged Big Sur coastline of California.

Bixby Bridge is one of the iconic sights along the rugged terrain of California Coast Highway (highway one) in the Big Sur area south of Monterey. Although it is not the only bridge of its type along this route – and, in my opinion, not necessarily the most visually impressive – it is no doubt the best known. Many people drive to this spot and stop to take in the view from high above the ocean and to photograph the bridge and this scenic section of the highway.

I have photographed this bridge before, and I’ve spent a bit of time scoping out alternative points of view. These include some locations visible from “behind” the bridge, up higher in the coastal hills, and from other nearby locations along the highway. While I have photographed the bridge from the backside in the past, the idea of photographing it in black and white from this vantage point was triggered by a photograph by Chris Morrison that I saw in an online photography forum. When I saw it, I almost immediately “saw” a slightly different composition of the bridge and the steep headlands and cliffs running south along the coast.

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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