Tag Archives: wash

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

Dry Mud and Sand

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Dry Mud and Sand
Dry, cracked mud on top of red sand under reflected canyon light, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument

Dry Mud and Sand. Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, Utah. October 25, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Dry, cracked mud on top of red sand under reflected canyon light, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument

I almost titled this photograph, “Another Photograph of Mud.” But I have resisted that temptation, and once again used a simple more or less objective title. But, indeed, this is almost a photographic type when it comes to the Southwest, and one that is awfully difficult to pass up. These formations come about when silt-laden water rushes down desert canyons, washes, and streams, leaving behind a layer of very wet silt. The layer may be thin, as it was in this case, or it may be quite thick. In one narrow canyon last year I slipped into such silt-mud and it almost seemed like there was not bottom!

I’m not sure quite what explains our fascination with these formations. Is it because they are among the most transient features of the physical landscape, disappearing and then reforming every time it rains? Is it the patterns themselves, which can have a wonderful geometric quality and, at the same time, embody a randomness? Is it the combination of the colors of the material, which can range from white through black with many colors in between, and the reflected canyon light? Possibly it is all of these things and more.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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

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

Dunes and Mountains

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Dunes and Mountains
Low dunes and the base of Tucki Mountain in evening light

Dunes and Mountains. Death Valley National Park, California. March 31, 2015. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Low dunes and the base of Tucki Mountain in evening light

This is a different interpretation of a photograph that I have previously posted. Here I have simply tried a different crop, one that eliminates some areas of from the top and bottom of the earlier photograph in order to focus more on the horizontal sweep of the shallow dunes and the more distant wash sloping up to the base of gigantic Tucki Mountain, here in nearly the last light of the evening.

I think that when we are in this place, one of the most iconic in Death Valley National Park, our attention is more likely to be drawn to the tallest dunes, which are located more or less behind me at this camera position. But there is much else to see here, ranging from the intimate landscape of ripple sand and small plants to the rugged slopes of Tucki Mountain just to the south, and including the many long views across the huge spaces of the valley. Here I had been mostly photographing an expanse of dunes leading off toward the northeast, when I turned around to see this view of the edge of the sand, with low dunes curving toward the sparse plant life at their edge.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Wash and Eroded Hills

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Wash and Eroded Hills
Wash and Eroded Hills

Wash and Eroded Hills. Death Valley National Park, California. April 3, 2015. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Morning light shines on eroded hills and a desert wash.

This was the final morning of my spring photographic excursion to Death Valley. On the last day of these visits I always seem to follow the same general ritual — I get up well before dawn (of course!) and visit one final photography location very early, then go back and break camp before leaving the park and starting the long drove back to the San Francisco Bay Area. This means that I almost always pick a familiar “sure thing” location for the last morning, and one that is not too far from wherever I camped the night before. I rarely make this a spur-of-the-moment decision, instead typically deciding ahead of time where I’ll go — there isn’t a lot of time to waste on this final, long day. On this trip I headed back to a little area not far from a familiar Death Valley icon. (I would stop at that icon, but only if the conditions turned out to be spectacularly unusual — I certainly don’t need another photograph of it otherwise, as beautiful as it is.)

I turned off the main road onto the gravel side road, slowed to a crawl, parked and got out with camera gear in hand, and quickly settled into the quiet and stillness of this place in the moments before dawn. Even though I have been to this spot many times, I’m still surprised by how quiet it is and by how few others go here. Although I know specific locations that might offer reliable and predictable photographs, once I’m here I prefer to take my time and look for and at things that I had not previously noticed. At first — and it was the case on this morning — it seems like there is little special to see, and I may momentarily wonder if I’m going to be able to find photographs. But as I slow down and begin to see, I invariably find things that I would have missed if I had not given the place some time. This photograph was the result of spotting a little path up to a higher spot — the path itself intrigued me so I followed it, and I was happy to find that it overlooked this little bit of classic Death Valley geography.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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

Dunes and Mountains

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Dunes and Mountains
Dunes and Mountains

Dunes and Mountains. Death Valley National Park, California. March 31, 2015. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Low dunes and the base of Tucki Mountain in evening light

At the end of my first full day photographing Death Valley this spring I headed out onto the nearby sand dunes to look for whatever might show up in the evening light. I was close to one of the most iconic dunes in the park, but I found an out-of-the-way spot far enough away from that landmark that I had this area of the dunes completely to myself. Interesting things happen to the light and colors on the sand dunes during the short period of time leading up to sunset and for a short time afterwards. The dunes pick up low angle light that makes the textures of the dunes more visible and the light changes colors — first going toward warmer colors before the sunset, and gradually transitioning toward softer and more blue tones shortly after the sun goes down.

At first I wandered straight out into the dunes — well, perhaps not quite straight, as I tend to follow my instincts and an observer might think that my path looked a bit aimless. At one point I found some higher dunes from which I could see a bit farther of toward the northeast and from which I could look down on the complex patterns of the sand. After photographing there I turned back toward the direction from which I had come, and I saw this section of lower dunes dropping toward the edge of the sand, with the background of the lower folds of Tucki Mountain in late light.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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.