Tag Archives: two

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Travel, Photographs: Urban/Street

Storefront, Two Men

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Storefront, Two Men
Two men at a Manhattan storefront as a Columbus Day parade passes by.

Storefront, Two Men. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Two men at a Manhattan storefront as a Columbus Day parade passes by.

Switching gears again today, this is another photograph from our October East Coast visit. The trip was primarily to photograph autumn color in New England, but we managed to spend a couple of nights in Manhattan before our homeward flight. Our visit coincided with what New York still refers to as the “Columbus Day Parade,” though the more modern designation is apparently also along the lines of Italian Heritage Day. (One bizarrely noteworthy moment was seeing Rudy Giuliani yucking it up at the front of one of the floats, but I digress…) We wandered around the periphery of the parade route, where the onlookers were in many cases more fascinating than the parade itself.

I made this photograph using one of my “blind shooting” techniques. There are lots of different thoughts about how street photographers should (or should not) interact with their subjects, and I think they all have some validity. Here I did not want the subjects to be distracted by me, so I held the camera in front of me as I walked by and made a couple of exposures without look directly at the two men. I think it paid off. I feel like there are a number of ways to try to make sense of what is going on in the scene and what it might imply, but I’ll leave it to viewers to figure this out.

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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Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Travel

Two Windows

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Two Windows
Two windows and metallic walls at the Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco.

Two Windows. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Two windows and metallic walls at the Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco.

On my photographic walks in San Francisco — part of a familiar routine that begins with a train ride to The City — it isn’t unusual to pass through the area around Moscone Center and SFMOMA. Just a bit north of here I often follow a route that takes me on sidewalks that don’t border the streets, and I end up passing the fascinating architecture of the Contemporary Jewish Museum, with its angled, metal exterior walls.

As appealing as this structure is, I’ve often found it difficult to photograph. The area around it is somewhat constrained by the proximity of other buildings, and those buildings are visually quite dissonant with the design of this one. So, at least for me, photographs of the larger scale of the building are difficult, and I still don’t have one that I really like. However, moving in closer and working the textures, reflected colors, and the angles and surfaces close up is more promising.

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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Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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

Lenticular Clouds, Alpenglow Reflections

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Lenticular Clouds, Alpenglow Reflections
“Lenticular Clouds, Alpenglow Reflections” — Two lenticular clouds in the alpenglow above the Sierra Nevada crest, Yosemite National Park.

This photograph comes from her the end of the spectacular afternoon and evening that I’ve been posting about recently. To quickly recap, I saw lenticular clouds forming over the crest earlier in the day, headed to this spot that I had scoped out previously, then photographed all the way from pre-golden hour through sunset and on into the early dusk. This photograph was made just after sunset, when the pink light was still coloring the sky and the landscape but the blue of evening was gradually taking over.

If you head out into the landscape often to photograph, you will experience a lot of fine but unremarkable days. With care, you can make good photographs in those conditions. You’ll also experience a few “meh” days when nothing happens. (Deny all you want, but you’ve experience it!) But it seems like this earns you an occasional luminous miracle, when everything comes together and amazement ensues. If there is a downside to this, it might be having to explain to people that, “yes, this really happened!” That’s a small price to pay.

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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” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

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

Two Trees, Coastal Fog

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Two Trees, Coastal Fog
Two Monterey cypress trees in fog along the rugged north shore at Point Lobos.

Two Trees, Coastal Fog. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Two Monterey cypress trees in fog along the rugged north shore at Point Lobos.

As promised, here is yet another way of looking at the scene featuring the prominent tree on the left, a beautiful specimen of gnarled and weathered Monterey cypress along the north shore at Point Lobos. For this version I pulled back a bit and took in the larger scene, going with a semi-panoramic aspect ratio that includes a wider view and includes a second tree and the fog-shrouded ocean beyond.

Photographers (and practitioners of other arts) often describe some aesthetic object as being “perfect.” I’m not so sure that the term, at least in a classic sense, really works for such things. It implies that there is one “perfect” and ideal way of seeing or presenting something. It seems to me that there are multiple excellent ways to do such things, especially in the creation of art. If you asked me to select one of the four (yes, there’s still one more!) versions of this photograph as “the best,” I’d find it almost impossible to make a definitive choice.

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.

Blog | About | Twitter | Flickr | Facebook | Email

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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