Tag Archives: wash

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

Canyon and Strata

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Canyon and Strata
A desert wash in a winding badlands canyon leads toward contrasting strata, Death Valley National Park.

Canyon and Strata. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

A desert wash in a winding badlands canyon leads toward contrasting strata, Death Valley National Park.

This juxtaposition of very dark and very light layers in this badlands terrain has long fascinated me. Often the contrasts among the various layers are relatively subtle, even where obvious colors are involved — but here we see nearly the darkest forms right next to some of the lightest. The material in the foreground is perhaps closer to the typical coloration.

There is a lot to look at in terrain like this, especially when viewed from a slight elevation. In some ways the largest forms mimic and expand on the smallest. Tiny irregularities combine to produce larger versions of themselves, and then these combine to produce larger gullies, which themselves collect together to form that great washes that drain the landscape.

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

Desert Mountains and Wash, Evening

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Desert Mountains and Wash, Evening
The last of the day’s light illuminates a wash descending though desert mountains, Death Valley National Park.

Desert Mountains and Wash, Evening. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

The last of the day’s light illuminates a wash descending though desert mountains, Death Valley National Park.

This feels like a “quiet photograph” to me — a desert scene that appears to be almost entirely static. In fact, one of the most powerful desert experiences I have had in the desert comes from moments in lonely, quiet places where it seems that nothing is moving and that it has been that way for a very long while. It is as close to the feeling of time stopping as we’re likely to experience.

The truth is that I made this photograph in a location that is not exactly quiet and still. Very close to my position there were dozens of people lined up to photograph one of the icons of Death Valley. (This particular icon is interesting but not photographically compelling to me, but as I mentioned in another recent post… my perspective can change!) The photograph illustrates another useful idea in photography, that when you are faced with an obvious subject it is still good to look around at all of the other things that might be worthy of your attention.

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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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

Desert Mountains, Before Sunrise

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Desert Mountains, Before Sunrise
A canyon twists down through rugged desert mountains in pre-sunrise light.

Desert Mountains, Before Sunrise. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A canyon twists down through rugged desert mountains in pre-sunrise light.

One thing that has always appealed to me about the desert landscape — which for me often means the Death Valley landscape — is that the geology is laid bare almost everywhere. So many landscapes are to a great extent about what covers them — the forests, grasslands, lakes, meadows, rivers, and more. But here most of the vegetation is so sparse (or it matches the colors of rocks and soil so well) that we see straight to the underlying earth — the canyons, the colors of rock and soil, strata twisted and uplifted, runoff channels, landslides, fans, and more.

This canyon descends toward Death Valley from high in the Panamint Mountains, following a twisting path down from the heights as it links up tributary valleys and eventually forms a broad wash that spills out at the top of a gigantic gravel fan. I made this photograph before sunrise, when the soft, early light suffused the canyons and revealed subtle details that can be lost in harsher light later in the day.

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 | 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.

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

Wash and Alluvial Fan

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Wash and Alluvial Fan
Morning light on a giant alluvial fan at the base of a desert mountain wash.

Wash and Alluvial Fan. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Morning light on a giant alluvial fan at the base of a desert mountain wash.

The immense scale of the Death Valley landscape is one of its most impressive characteristics. I’ve written that it reminds me of places like The Yukon, where features stretch on over great distances, so large that it can be hard to make sense of them. One day I decided to go to a location at one extreme edge of the park. Starting roughly in the middle of the park, the trip took me close to two hours of driving, the last portion on a gravel road. I also contemplated visiting another location at the opposite end of the park — it would have been close to a 100 mile drive in the opposite direction, with more than 40 of it on gravel. Driving direct between these two points might have taken six hours and covered close to 150 miles. From many high places in this park you can look across many tens of miles, often so far that the landscape may simply disappear in the distant haze.

It isn’t just the travel distances that are huge — many of the features of the landscape are so large that they defy an accurate sense of scale. The gravel fan in this photograph, spilling out of a narrow canyon at the base of one of the parks large mountain ranges, is likely about ten miles from my camera position and probably at least 1000 feet above the valley floor. It would take a full day to walk there, with no trail to follow. I made the photograph as the first direct sunlight had worked its way down the face of the mountain range.

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 | 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.