Tag Archives: valley

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

Hills and Trees Near Limantour, Drakes Bay

August 26, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Soft sun light on trees and hills above Limantour Beach, as fog bank hovers over Drakes Bay, Point Reyes National Seashore.

Limantour Beach sits along the inner curve of Drakes Bay at the Point Reyes National Seashore north of San Francisco, California, and the area is one of the best-known and most visited in the park. On certain days, the air is clear and the sun is bright and the beach can be warm, and the view includes not only the nearby wildlife and the surf, but the peninsula leading to the tip of Point Reyes and the coast stretching south towards the Marin Headlands and the Golden Gate. One of the first times I visited this place to make photographs it was one of those clear days, and I recall photographing the curve of the Bay leading to the right with the beach and some birds in the foreground. I’ve carried a mental images of how I would like to improve that photograph, and it was with that in mind that I went to Limantour this time.

The weather did not cooperate with that plan. After crossing the ridge between Tomales Bay and Limantour, I could see right away that there was going to be fog along the beach. The shoreline edge of the water still reflected blue sky in a few spots a bit to the south, but at Limantour the fog came a good distance inland from the beach. So as I drove down toward the end of the road, I started looking for some spot that would let me photograph the rounded, grass-covered hills and the bits of forest in sunlight, with the Bay and its fog in the distance. Finding a spot that included all of these things and which made some visual sense was not easy, but with a bit of back-tracking I finally found this spot and made a few exposures.

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Commentary, Ideas

Photographing Icons – Or Not

August 17, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 9 Comments

Yesterday I shared elsewhere a photograph that someone had posted featuring a line-up of scores of photographers, arrayed tripod-to-tripod, ready to photograph one of those iconic views that we all know so well. I suspect that we have all been to such places and either found the experience of seeing and photographing them to be powerful… or we might have been repulsed by the crowds of people all apparently trying to “capture” the same thing, among them perhaps a number of folks who might be trying to almost literally recreate versions of the scene that they had seen elsewhere.

The point of the share (seen here and here) was not complimentary. My reaction to the photograph was to wonder, even more than usual, why people would want to make photographs that way. I phrased it as, more or less, “yet another reason to avoid photographing icons.”

However, a person wrote to me after I posted and pointed out, with a bit of anger and with some justification I think, that complaining about and putting down those who want to photograph a beautiful place might seem a bit pretentious and self-righteous.

She has a point.

While there is something a bit troubling about seeing dozens of people lined up to make the very same photograph, some of us might be a bit too quick to jump to overly negative conclusions. Perhaps there is a way to cast this as a positive lesson, rather than ridicule. So let me engage in a bit of reflection and honesty. Continue reading Photographing Icons – Or Not →

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

Mount Conness and Ragged Peak, Forest

July 31, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 1 Comment

Evening light slants across forest below Ragged Peak and Mount Conness, Yosemite National Park, California.

This photograph was made from the Tuolumne Meadows area with a long lens, and it includes the heights of Mt. Conness at the far right, the lesser prominence of Ragged Peak at the left, a shaded ridge running above the Young Lakes basin, and a closer bit of typical Yosemite forest mixed with a bit of dome-like granite, with sunset light slanting across from the left. By the way, I wondered for some time where the name “Mt. Conness” came from. I finally looked it up during the past year, and I found out that the namesake was Senator Conness, one of the two California senators during roughly the Civil War period – Conness was responsible for the legislation that initially set parts of the current Yosemite National Park aside for protection and preservation. All in all, a person deserving of a peak with his name.

Although photographed here from some distance, I know parts of the landscape encompassed by this photograph quite well, including the visible portions and some that are hidden from sight in this photo. For a number of years I have made a habit of visiting the Young Lakes area at least once each season, often late in the season when the summer crowds have dissipated – though I have also visited very early in the season, and I have the mosquito stories to prove it! Young Lakes lie on the other side of the shaded ridge traversing the center of the photograph, and I’ve often looked up at that ridge from the lakes. I have also hiked up into the valley on this side of the ridge. The trail to Young Lakes crosses the wooded area beyond the sunlit trees and passes through a beautiful semi-meadow area below Ragged Peak, a place where beautiful lupine flowers may be found at the right time of the year and from where one can obtain some panoramic views of a lot of high Yosemite Peaks. On one of my first visits to Young Lakes, it was so late in the season that the backcountry ranger who was patrolling the area apparently had little to do, and one morning we ended up having a very long conversation along the shore of one of the lakes. I remarked that a particular little gully in roughly the area of Ragged Peak looked like it might be interesting, and he shared enough information about the route that I chose to use it rather than the regular trail on my return to the trailhead. Mt. Conness, here the only peak or ridge still fully in sunlight, towers above everything else in this area. I have not climbed it, though I have investigated some trail less areas around its base and I’ve looked at it from almost every side.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Sandstone Formations, Morning

June 4, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Early morning light illuminates fins, towers, cliffs and ridges in Arches National Park, Utah.

After the better part of a week photographing in Utah in early April, the day came to start the long drive back to California. But on the last morning I rose very early and made one last trip up from Moab into Arches National Park to photograph in the morning light. I started up on the ridge around the Windows area, looking for suitable sandstone formations to frame the setting full moon. (Still not sure whether or not the photographs of that subject are going to be share-able or not – we’ll see!) From there I headed back toward the Petrified Dunes area from which a panoramic view of many subjects is available – the towers and spires and arches up on the ridge near the Windows, the La Salle Mountains in the distance, and the huge sandstone formations down in the Wall Street area.

This photograph includes a more distant view of the latter area. Most often I think we view these features from close up, and look up at them from below. And when we are close to them we are more likely to consider one or perhaps a couple of them at once. However, from this elevated and more distant vantage point, the individual features and formations are seen more clearly as part of the larger landscape. From front to back there are first some isolated sandstone features standing alone and apart. Beyond them are the walls of the, well, Wall Street area, which are largely intact but have eroded away in some areas. Next there is a narrow canyon, in shadow in this photograph, and beyond that a wider and more solid wall running down from left to right. This one is thicker and there is a bit of a plateau on top where it appears that plants grow. Then there is yet another valley, another ridge, and the sequence continues on beyond the upper edge of the photograph.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: valley

Hills and Trees Near Limantour, Drakes Bay

Photographing Icons – Or Not

Mount Conness and Ragged Peak, Forest

Sandstone Formations, Morning

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