Tag Archives: sun

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Clearing Clouds, Merced River Canyon

May 4, 2018 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The morning sun breaks through clearing clouds above Merced Canyon

If I had to choose my favorite conditions of atmosphere and light, something like this morning would be on my short list. The light was a surprise that emerged after I had almost written off the potential as being bland and gray. Since the clouds were in motion, the light was constantly changing — at moments it actually was not that interesting, but suddenly the clouds would shift and light would emerge, frequently moving across the scene and providing more than one opportunity. There were multiple levels and types of clouds. A thick overcast lay high above, though it was occasionally broken. Other clouds occasionally formed directly on the peaks, and others drifted below me, often low enough to count as fog. This show actually continued for several hours.

The location here is a fairly iconic spot that many who have visited Yosemite will immediately recognize. (However, as I discovered as visitors new to the park stopped and asked questions, to many this is a wholly unfamiliar view, which probably makes in even more spectacular to them.) If you look closely you will likely recognize the famous feature that provides a point of focus. The vantage point gives a view looking up the canyon of the Merced River and into the lower end of Yosemite Valley. This section has more of the v-shape of a river gorge, but the classic glacial u-shape begins under the brightest section of the lower clouds and then tracks to the left. Those light beams are real, and as I photographed they were traversing the scene from right to left.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Trees, Sunlight, Waterfall Spray

April 30, 2018 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Bare trees silhouetted against the sunlit spray of a Yosemite waterfall.

For decades I have had an informal tradition of stopping at a waterfall during my first spring visit to Yosemite Valley, and getting as close — and as wet! — as possible as my way of saying goodbye to the cold winter season and hello to the upcoming warmer times of the year. Most often the location has been Bridal Veil Fall, one of the most accessible in The Valley and one that reliably produces clothing-soaking mist early in the season. Although I have photographed this “event,” the point of the visit has rarely been photographic — it is more about a reconnection with a favorite time of year in the Sierra and a personal celebration of the wild flow of melting snow at this time of the year.

But, of course, I can’t entirely avoid photographing the thing. That said, photographing the drenching torrent up close presents some problems. Cameras don’t like mist-filled air, especially when the mist is sometimes thick enough to act more like rain. Even if your camera is protected against water, you lens is going to get soaked quickly, and water-covered lenses and most landscape photography don’t mix. So my approach is to work quickly with a handheld camera. I know these lovely trees from previous visits, and I was hoping I could get close enough to photograph them against the clouds of spray coming from the waterfall, silhouetted against the brilliant backlit mist. I pre-selected a lens, stuck the camera in a waterproof bag, and headed up the short trail, quickly getting to the location of these trees. Standing behind a larger tree, I unzipped the bag and took out the camera. I stepped out of the shelter of the tree, pointed the camera up towards these slender trees, composed the image I had in mind, and made perhaps a half-dozen exposures before things got to wet and I had to retreat.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Steps, Red Door In Sun

April 19, 2018 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Manhattan residence building with steps and a sunlit red door

It is hard to resist a red door in morning sunlight. :-) The photograph comes from 2014, on one of our frequent visits to New York City to visit family, eat a lot of food, and do street photography. When in New York (and sometimes other boroughs including Brooklyn and Queens) we walk a lot. We’ve been known to walk into Manhattan from Brooklyn, or walk all the way up from the lower end of Manhattan to and into Central Park.

While I don’t recall the specifics of this photograph (though I think I have a general sense of where we were) I know we were out for one of those walks. I’m also pretty certain that this was more or less a quick shot as we walked past this little residential area. The reason this photograph show up now is one of those serendipitous stories. A week or two ago someone asked me a slightly technical photography question. I thought that I might be able to illustrate an answer by using an urban photograph made with a somewhat wide-angle lens, so I began to wade back into older New York photographs to see what I could find. In the end I never used any of them to respond to the question, but I did find a set of four-year-old raw files that I must have neglected to consider at the time.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Trees In Sun, Cliff In Shadow

March 26, 2018 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Sun from behind an ice-rimmed granite monolith lights a row of trees at the edge of a meadow

I made this photograph on a day of somewhat ephemeral conditions. There had been snow the day before — light snow, but in very cold conditions. On this morning the storm had passed, but it was so cold that a thin layer of snow was still there. It was in the meadows, on the branches of trees, and collected on every small irregularity on the granite cliffs above Yosemite Valley. At the moment I made this photograph the sunlight, shining through thin clouds, had just arrived on the closest trees, while those in the distance remained in cold shadows.

The light and the snow patterns on the face of the granite monolith are remarkable. The small amount of snow — perhaps only and inch or two — brought the patterns of cracks and small ledges into relief, making visible features that we might overlook on a warmer day And the light on the cliff is rather blue since the face is illuminated not by direct sunlight, but instead by the giant “light panel in the sky,” which happens to be very blue!

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: sun

Clearing Clouds, Merced River Canyon

Trees, Sunlight, Waterfall Spray

Steps, Red Door In Sun

Trees In Sun, Cliff In Shadow

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