Tag Archives: surface

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Drakes Bay, Fog

August 24, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Fog bank suspended above the surface of Drakes Bay, Point Reyes National Seashore.

What could possibly go together more naturally than fog and Point Reyes? Living in the San Francisco Bay Area, Point Reyes National Seashore is one of those treasures that is close enough that I can manage to visit frequently and throughout the year. However, I’m still trying to “get my mind around” the place as a photographic subject. Some aspects of it are relatively easy to see in photographic terms – these include some of the wildlife (such as elephant seals and tule elk), the tall and rocky coastal bluffs and the beaches often found below them, and certain beaches. Others are not, at least for me, so obvious. I find that some very beautiful things, such as the dense forests of short trees, hills covered with dry grasses and scattered bushes, and fog shrouded valleys, are not always easy subjects from which to make effective photographs.

This scene (if “scene” is the word for it) could be almost anywhere in along the hundreds of miles of the California Pacific coast, and it belongs to my “minimalist seascape” thread, something I’ve been attracted to for a while now. On this afternoon I had decided to go to Limantour Beach, hoping for sun and enough clarity in the air that I could make some photographs across Drakes Bay that I’ve been thinking about. Earlier in the day, things looked promising for that, but when I arrived the fog bank was hovering just along the shoreline and making its way inland nearby. Looking a bit more to the south, the sky was clear – and in between these areas there was a wonderful play of light between the areas covered by fog and the occasional gaps where more light still shone through.

I have been there a couple of times this month and on both occasions I had… fog!

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: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Owens Valley

Three Towers, Morning

July 26, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Three tufa towers in morning light, surrounded by wind-blown patterns on the surface of Mono Lake, California.

In mid-July I was in the Tuolumne/Tioga Pass area of the Sierra for a few days of photograph. In the end, I decided to stay over one extra night so that I could drive down to photograph around Mono Lake early in the morning before heading home. I was up before dawn, quickly in my car, and down to the shoreline of Mono Lake before sunrise. My first objective was to try to photograph sand tufa formations – not the more famous tufa towers. I found what I was looking for, and spend the sunrise period photographing them in first light. However, this opportunity quickly ended, so I turned my attention to the lake itself, along with its surroundings of low hills.

While the tufa towers are the iconic visual symbols of Mono Lake, I have some other and perhaps strong associations with the place. Most of them are connected to a time of day, early morning, when I most often visit. They involve near silence, broken only by the sounds of the many gulls and other birds that are found in and around the lake. In my memories, the air is still, and it is warm, the warm of early an early desert morning that holds the smell of sage and dust. And while the moment of sunrise is what I often go there to find, in the end it is the light that comes a bit later that sticks most in my mind. This light is bright – almost too bright to look into if the lake is hazy – and it is blue with distance. This is the light that I saw on this morning, with a bit of very light breeze forming slight patterns on the surface of the lake near three isolated tufa towers.

Photographs: Abstract, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Textures, Photographs: Yosemite

Reflected Evening Sky, Tuolumne River

July 15, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A solitary boulder interrupts the flow of the Tuolumne River as it reflects the colors of sunset sky, Yosemite National Park.

I’m just back from a few days photographing in the greater Tuolumne Meadows area of the Yosemite and the Sierra. I stayed in Tuolumne for a couple of nights and then one additional night at a forest service campground just east of the pass, allowing me the better part of four days of photography in the area between about Tenaya Lake and the pass, plus some areas east of the pass. I even managed to get down to Mono Lake for one very early morning shoot. For those who haven’t been up there yet this season, this is a very different year in many ways related to climate. It is dry! There is virtually no snow left except in the usual “permanent” areas on the highest peaks, water levels are very low, and overall it looks a lot more like late August or even September. (But look around and you’ll still find wildflowers.) Areas of the forest, especially higher up and near passes, seem to have suffered a lot of damage in a late-2011 wind storm. I’ve never seen so many trees downed by wind as I saw near Tioga Pass on this visit.

Since I was camping in Tuolumne Meadows, one day I used the midday hours that are less conducive to photography to scout a few locations along the Tuolumne River. I wandered down from camp, across the meadows, and over towards Soda Springs. From here I picked out a few likely prospects for evening photography – a bend in the river with some interesting trees, a large boulder that might front a photograph of the Cockscomb, and a few others. That evening I returned, hoping for interesting lighting. It was one of those evenings that held the possibility of very interesting sunset and post-sunset light. There were dissipating clouds above the Sierra crest, some clouds directly overhead, and clearing to the west. These conditions can allow light to shine up under the clouds from the west at sunset, and can produce intensely colorful displays. I never know for sure that this will happen, but I know that the conditions increase the chances a great deal… so I’m willing to be there and ready to photograph if it does happen. On this evening it didn’t quite happen. It was a lovely evening and there were colors, but nothing tremendously out of the (relatively nice) ordinary. During the last few minutes of color I was thinking about how there was nothing to the west that could make a photograph that included the light appearing that direction, when I happened to look down on the surface of the river to see this rock and these patterns on the surface of the water.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Forest, Tarn, and Granite

July 8, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 1 Comment

Sierra forest and granite reflected in the surface of a small tarn, Yosemite National Park.

Having visited the Sierra and the Yosemite high country for more than a few decades, I have become attached to a number of small and unlikely little places that have personal meaning to me. This is one of those odd little spots. At a point along Tioga Pass Road there is a small unmarked turnout like many other such turnouts along this route. One time a few years ago I stopped here for reasons that I can no longer recall. I got out of the car and noticed a very faint path leading away from the road – so, of course, I took it! It led though tightly spaced trees and towards a small canyon, passing several small ponds along the way. I also recall mosquitos. Lots of mosquitos.

Since that time I have returned to this spot quite a few times – in snow on the day that the road first opens, on sunny summer days like this one, and on damp and foggy evenings in late fall not long before the highway closes for the season. Where is the spot, exactly? All I’ll say is that it is in Yosemite and that you can get to it by walking away from Tioga Pass Road. Frankly, I don’t think the specific location really matters to anyone but me and perhaps a few others who might stop here, too. There are thousands of such little spots throughout the Sierra, and it is your discovery of your own personal places among them that can make them special.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: surface

Three Towers, Morning

Reflected Evening Sky, Tuolumne River

Forest, Tarn, and Granite

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