Tag Archives: travel

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

Sea Stacks, Big Sur Coastline

February 3, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The receding ridges of the Big Sur coastline arc southward into winter haze beyond a pair of large sea stacks.

On the final day of January we did the “down and back” drive through the Big Sur area of California’s Pacific Coast Highway. This is my favorite time of year in this part of California. At one point along the drive I made a comment (as I often do while passing through here at this time of year) about how this weather felt more like a “typical summer day” than like a “typical winter day” – and then I quickly caught myself and recalled that “typical summer days” here often feature thick fog, wind, and cold. On the other hand, between Pacific storms – or during a dry year like this one – a typical winter day may feature brilliant sunshine and long vistas and temperatures that are as warm as those of summer here.

As the day developed I shifted from looking for the effects of first and early light coming over ridges and into canyons, or the thinning offshore clouds. Instead I started to think about the long coastal vistas, the intense reflection of the ocean seen from high places (which always makes me think of molten metal), and the way that the backlit atmosphere highlights receding ridges as they disappear into the distance. As we came over one of the high points and around the corner the road began to drop and this view appeared in front of us, with two sea stacks in the foreground (one of which contains a natural arch) and the rugged coastline curving toward the south.

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

Red Storefront With Mural

February 2, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Red doors and window frames and brightly painted mural on a New York shop

Given the date, I suppose that this is a sort of Christmas photograph! We had arrived in New York the evening before, and while we had Christmas plans in Brooklyn, those were scheduled for much later in the day, so we ended up out and about in Lower Manhattan on a cold Christmas morning. Initially we headed south toward the financial district and the World Trade Center site – where it seemed that pretty much the only people around were our fellow tourists.

We finished up there and decided to head back to the hotel for a bit before going to Brooklyn. Starting this day and continuing throughout our weeklong stay, this small food stand became something of an icon, as we walked past it on the way to and from our Canal Street hotel daily. Oddly, when the place was closed it was at its most visually interesting, with a roll up door that had been painted brightly with the images of cars as you see here. The whole thing was behind an exterior set of glass windows/doors, the frame of which was painted the most gaudy shade of red imaginable.

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Erosion Patterns

January 27, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Deeply furrowed erosion patterns in early morning light, Death Valley National Park

I spent some time photographing Death Valley National Park in mid-December, during a very cold time of the year. It is not unusual for the place to be surprisingly cold in the middle of winter, but this was a period of exceptional cold and it got down to 25 degrees in the Valley and much colder in some of the places I visited in the surrounding desert mountains. I had arrived the evening before I made this photograph, and a sequence of events on the drive it suggest an inauspicious beginning to this visit. I usually come in through Ridgecrest and then up through Trona. I usually drive almost straight through to Ridgecrest and then take a long, late lunch break there – getting my last espresso until I come back out of the park, filling up the gas tank, and so forth. I killed pretty close to an hour taking care of these odds and ends, and then started out of town toward Trona.

Less than a mile up the road I ran into a flashing warning sign announcing that this entrance to the park was closed! This necessitated a bit of backtracking and then travel north up US 395 to then head east toward the park on highway 190. I had originally planned to arrive by mid-afternoon, set up camp, and then photograph in the evening… but by the time I finished all of this driving it was dark when I arrived and I simply pulled into the campground and slept in my car. Early the next morning, feeling just a bit disconnected, I drove over towards 20 Mule Team Canyon where I knew I should be able to find some nice morning light. In fact I did, and I soon found this beautiful miniature landscape of nearly parallel gullies in a hillside along the canyon. As the first light hit the edges off the ridges between the gullies I found a composition that mostly filled the frame with them. I finished shooting here and moved on. At my next location, I finally must have engaged my brain, and I checked the camera to find that it had been left on ISO 3200 from my previous work photographing musicians backstage at a concert in natural light. Groan! So this photograph is one that I managed to salvage from that little escapade… and I’m grateful for the relatively good performance of modern cameras… even when the operator is not paying attention!

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Chinatown, New York City

January 26, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Looking up Madison Street from the Manhattan Bridge, New York City

At least I think this is Madison Street, as best as I can tell by looking at maps now that I am back in California. We were up on the Manhattan Bridge when I made this photograph, high above the street level as the bridge crosses over the east shore of Manhattan. We had walked over from Brooklyn, sharing the bridge with the noisy trains and looking at the extensive graffiti on rooftops.

Our hotel was more or less on the other side of China Town on Canal Street, and we had been into that area several times, starting with a visit to a Chinese restaurant where we joined a big group of family and friends on the evening that we arrived from California. But we had not been all the way through the area to the east shoreline. The Manhattan Bridge provides some very interesting views down into this section of Manhattan. Before this point we had passed next to and above the graffiti covered rooftops that I mentioned above. Here we could look directly down on this street and up toward its end point some blocks in the distance.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: travel

Sea Stacks, Big Sur Coastline

Red Storefront With Mural

Erosion Patterns

Chinatown, New York City

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