Tag Archives: urban

Photographs: Night, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Path Above San Francisco

December 29, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A person walks on a path through a grove above the night lights of San Francisco

This is another of my handheld night photographs, something I’ve been experimenting with for a couple of years now. Newer high ISO small handheld cameras make it possible to work without a tripod in the urban landscape, essentially doing street photography in the (near) darkness. While there are some compromises in pure image quality — more noise to deal with in post, and greater potential for motion blur, working this way makes in possible to photograph in ways that just aren’t possible with a tripod. I can move quickly and respond to changing subjects more readily, and I’m less of an obvious intrusion on the scene.

This photograph might seem like one for which a tripod would be appropriate. I can’t argue with that on a technical basis. But I point out that between the time I saw this person walking along the path and the time I made three quick exposures was measured in seconds. With a tripod-mounted camera I simply would not have been able to make the photograph.

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

Photographs: Night, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Trolley Stop

December 23, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Trolley stop lights along a San Francisco street

For some reason the public transit stations and stops in San Francisco have long intrigued me. I think it may be a combination of things: people often pause there and may present interesting subjects, the forms and colors of some of the shelters are interesting, and they are, of course, a part of the overall urban environment here.

I was photographing an area of buildings and walkways along the San Francisco waterfront when I noticed this stop, sitting in the middle of the road that passed by. The glow inside the shelter was the only significant source of light, with only pinpoints of light from nearby windows and street lights to supplement it.

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

Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Say Hello

December 20, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A sidewalk display outside a San Francisco store

The journey from yesterday’s “photograph of the day” (birds in the predawn light above Central California wetlands) to today’s photograph may rightly be regarded as an example of moving from the sublime to the ridiculous. But I think that the ridiculous is also frequently worthy of a photograph — though it may not be worth quite as many descriptive words.

We were out walking in downtown San Francisco, and I was in street photographer mode. I’ve actually photographed things in front of this shop — a liquor store — in the past, so I think that slightly off-kilter advertising is part of their plan. It may be difficult to see in this small on-screen jpg image, but there are some interesting and slightly odd things inside the store window, too.

Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

From The Gallery Window

December 17, 2017 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A San Francisco street scene viewed from the window of a photography gallery

We came to this place more or less by chance. It was a somewhat lazy day for us — we had attended a concert the night before and stayed overnight near the venue. Since we had another concert coming up on the second evening we decided to not have any serious plans in the morning. We got up late and finally wandered down past City Hall, through a farmers market, and then headed down Market Street. At one point I happened to look across the street and see the sign for “SF Camerawork” above an unlikely looking storefront, so we walked across to take a look, noticed that it was scheduled to open in less than 10 minutes, and decided we would stick around and take a look.

It probably seems odd that I hadn’t ever visited before, especially since this organization has existed in the City for decades, but sometimes odd things happen. In any case, the door finally opened, we climbed the long and marrow stairway, and arrived to find them in the process if installing an upcoming show: Landmark: Yosemite Through The Lens of Contemporary Landscape Photography. Despite the unfinished state of the installation, they allowed us to poke around and see the work that was already hung. They had one of Jerry Uelsmann’s fantastical landscape, several of the Mark Klett & Byron Wolfe juxtapositions of classic photographs collaged with modern photos of the same locations, a few witty Ted Orland pieces, and more. The exhibition space itself is very nice — open and with good light — and at one point I wandered to one of the street-facing windows and took advantage of the upper story location to make a few photographs of the street below.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: urban

Path Above San Francisco

Trolley Stop

Say Hello

From The Gallery Window

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