Tag Archives: street

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Urban Landscape, Dusk – San Francisco

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Urban Landscape, Dusk - San Francisco

Urban Landscape, Dusk – San Francisco. San Francisco, California. May 26, 2009. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Urban landscape – downtown buildings of San Francisco near AT&T Park at dusk.

This “almost-night” photograph was shot hand held from the upper level of AT&T Park just as the light was getting to the point where shooting this way would have been impossible. This is an urban landscape – and despite the very different subject matter I’ve photographed wild landscape scenes with very similar lighting effects.

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

keywords: urban, landscape, downtown, center, building, skyscraper, street, light, apartment, condominium, window, sidewalk, sky, dusk, twilight, sunset, blue, reflection, balcony, column, glass, att, park, giants, sf, san francisco, california, travel, scenic, night, city, skyline, scape, vertical, stock

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Brick Building Near AT&T Park

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Brick Building Near AT&T Park

Brick Building Near AT&T Park. San Francisco, California. May 27, 2009. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Brick building viewed from the upper reachs of AT&T Park in San Francisco, California.

Continuing with my habit of shooting near sunset from AT&T Park when I go to SF Giants games, this photograph concentrates on some brick buildings and rooftops across the street from the stadium – I think of this as an urban landscape photograph.

A challenge of these photographs is that I must work hand held and at very low shutter speeds, and I can really only bring a single lens – the ballpark apparently doesn’t look kindly on people bringing professional-looking gear into the park, and I’m certain that a tripod would be out of the question. So I shoot with a full-frame body and a 24-105 image-stabilized lens, often going to ISO 400 or ISO 800. Some photographs are shot with exposures as long as 1/6 second.

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

keywords: att, at&t, park, stadium, ball, baseball, giants, sf, san francisco, california, usa, travel, brick, building, roof, window, stairs, fire escape, ventilation, vent, window, light, steps, old, urban, landscape, weathered, downtown, city, 2nd, street, king, perspective, stock

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Dusk, 2nd and King Streets, San Francisco

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Dusk, 2nd and King Streets, San Francisco

Dusk, 2nd and King Streets, San Francisco. San Francisco, California. May 15, 2009. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Street scene at 2nd and King Streets with elements of the San Francisco skyline and Bay and the San Francisco Oakland Bay Bridge – photographed from AT&T Park.

Switching gears away from the natural landscapes I’ve been posting recently, here is an urban landscape. I was at a Giants-Mets game at AT&T Park in San Francisco (I’d rather not discuss the score, OK? ;-) on a beautiful mid-May Friday evening with my wife. While I do like the baseball (especially on those occasions when the Giants actually play well…) I also like all of the other stuff that makes the ballpark experience what it is: the view of San Francisco Bay (especially as the sun sets), ballpark food (but why oh why did they take away my lemon chicken sausages!?) and wandering around looking at the ball park and the crowd. I also like the great views from around the upper deck of the park.

About 15 minutes before sunset I told my (very understanding) wife that I was going to wander off for a while and do some photography as the last light fell on the City and the bay. There are really wonderful views toward downtown (especially if the fog is just starting to come in – which didn’t happen on this evening) and out toward the SF Oakland Bay Bridge and the rest of the bay. This photograph overlooks the intersection of 2nd and King Streets and, beyond, the Bay Bridge and Yerba Buena and Treasure Islands.

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

keywords: san francisco, frisco, california, the city, usa, 2nd, king, street, downtown, muni, train, rail, light, paragon, restaurant, crosswalk, car, truck, dusk, sunset, evening, oakland, bridge, yerba buena, treasure, island, person, tree, building, structure, urban, tower, skyscraper, giants, stadium, park, at&t, baseball, upper, deck, walkway, sky, travel, stock

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Night, Photographs: Structures and Objects

Nimitz Avenue at Night

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Nimitz Avenue at Night

Nimitz Avenue at Night. Mare Island Naval Shipyard, California. March 7, 2009. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Night photograph of buildings and shipyard structures along Nimitz Avenue near the waterfront at Mare Island Naval Shipyard, Vallejo, California.

This is perhaps one of the “classic” Mare Island Naval Shipyard scenes, where the giant shipyard scaffolding crosses Nimitz Avenue from the shipyard buildings to the shoreline facilities, varieties of artificial light lend a warm glow to the view up the street, and faint star trails appear above in the dark sky.

I think that this is a good scene for first-time Mare Island night photographers to work with. It presents a lot of interesting challenges, but they can all be handled with some thought and care. You need to get the sky right – not too light and you want at least some star trails. I could have done a longer exposure since a bit more than three minutes left me with short star trails, though they weren’t my main subject. The dynamic range is absolutely huge, especially if you don’t take care to obstruct direct line of sight to some of the lights up the street. I had to look around quite a bit to find one small spot where the composition worked and the buildings and towers are positioned to block them. If you don’t block them you either completely blow out those highlights or else you must shorten the exposure to the point that the foreground roadway ends up almost completely black. The lighting also has to be just right on the structures at the top of the frame. On this night we were perhaps 3 or 4 days short of the full moon so a combination of moonlight and artificial light illuminated the structure. (A full moon might have been a bit better.) Then you need the right focal length to get the right parts of the scene into the frame. Here I used a 35mm prime on a full-frame DSLR and cropped the result a bit to eliminate some distractions along the right edge.

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

keywords: mare island, naval, shipyard, minsy, night, photography, nocturnes, vallejo, california, usa, building, road, tracks, rail, train, shipyard, structures, minsy, brick, street, sky, star trails, smoke, stack, smokestack, truss, nocturnes, window, light, stock