Tag Archives: wood

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: People, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Man Descending Peter Macchiarini Steps

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Man Descending Peter Macchiarini Steps
Man Descending Peter Macchiarini Steps

Man Descending Peter Macchiarini Steps. San Francisco, California. July 12, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A man descends the Peter Macchiarini steps past worn and dilapidated buildings in downtown San Francisco.

I photographed this rather bleak scene on a side street in San Francisco last summer. I first walked up this street to photograph the “Peter Macchiarini Steps” that ascend steeply here in place of a normal sidewalk. Then I saw the opposing shapes of the large square ductwork and the smaller round pipes against the weathered and dilapidated exterior of the buildings. Finally, I found that the occasional person descending the steps might add a point of interest, so I waited…

When I look at a photograph like this one I see layers of different things – but maybe that’s just me! :-) At one level it is just a slightly gritty little street scene, presented in a pretty unvarnished manner. (I did some work to straighten angles and so forth in post – I generally don’t get to use tilt/shift lenses when I shoot street!) Then I see several interesting-to-me geometries in the scene. I mentioned above the opposing bends of the pipes and ducts and their relative positions on the wall. I also see a collection of rectangular shapes throughout the frame: the lighter area of wall behind the figure, the doors in the lower center, the small window above the doors, the three upper windows, and the sections of wall between them. Then there are a bunch of horizontal components: the large lighter band across the upper center, the very small patterns of the siding, the sequence of upper story windows against siding, the lower edge of the siding. And within these separate layers of order there are things that don’t quite fit. The man of course, wearing black and in motion with one foot suspended in mid-step, but also the trash can in front of him – also black, the bits of conduit running in odd directions, the small section of pipe in front of the door, and the concrete sidewalk steps.

Of course, you are free to see a picture of some guy walking down the steps…

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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: Architecture, Photographs: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Shack with Red and Green Interior Lights

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Shack with Red and Green Interior Lights
Shack with Red and Green Interior Lights

Shack with Red and Green Interior Lights. Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, California. February 26, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A small shack with interior lit by red and green lights at the Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, California.

At last weekend’s night photography shoot with The Nocturnes at Mare Island Naval Ship Yard I wandered a bit further afield than I have on some previous visits, eventually ending up in an area where I have only photographed once before when I unsuccessfully shot a couple of large barn-like buildings. (I think I have a shot of these buildings from this trip that I like, and I’ll post it later on.)

While spending nearly a half hour photographing a light post against the backdrop of a very dark brick building (which amounted to two photographs, given the long exposure times and the follow-up “dark frame exposures) I kept thinking I saw a faint red glow inside a small nearby building. At first I thought that one of my fellow night photographers might be doing some light painting, but the light seemed awfully dim. Eventually I noticed that it was also quite constant – and light painting virtually always involves moving the hand held light source around in order to get a smooth lighting effect. Once I finished shooting the light pole (unsuccessfully, it turns out) I decided I would go over and see what was creating this light.

The buildings appears to be a small “guard shack” or similar, a very old and very dilapidated one room structure. Inside, as best as I could tell, there is a small table, a few chairs, a digital clock of some sort with green letters, and some kind of very dim red light. Intrigued, I decided to see if I could photograph it. One technical problem was going to be the very large difference in lighting between the bright light on the clock and the extremely dim exterior, made worse by the dark color of the building. I figured that I could probably put enough extra light onto the building’s exterior using a very small key chain LED light than I happened to have with me, and that is the major source of light on the front of the building and on the yellow foreground curve – I simply walked around on both sides of the building and moved the small light over its surface.

In the end, I think this is another example of night photography as a source of a certain kind of “fantastic” lighting. The actual scene was very, very dim, and the the intensity of the colors here is almost entirely the result of the very long exposure and a bit of improvised lighting on the yellow curb behind the fence – a photograph of something that cannot be seen with our own eyes.

More Night Photography

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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: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Lamp, the ‘UFO Building” at Night

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Lamp, the 'UFO Building" at Night
Lamp, the 'UFO Building" at Night

Lamp, the ‘UFO Building” at Night. Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, California. February 12, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A lamp casts a shadow in bright artificial light in a night photograph of the wall of the ‘UFO Building’ at Mare Island Naval Shipyard.

The first time I photographed the side of this weathered and peeling building and Mare Island Naval Ship Yard, I didn’t see the feature that gives this building its informal name. I’ll be that you can though, right? Due to a lucky alignment of this small exterior lamp (which appears to be non-functional) and some nearby sodium vapor lamps, the lamp casts a shadow on the corrugated wall of the building that has a striking and easily recognized shape!

It may not immediately be apparent that this photograph was made at night in very low light. However, a look at the lighting should make it apparent that this cannot be daytime light. Note that the lamp that creates a shadow to its right… is also getting some nice illumination from the right side! One of the fun things about shooting in an industrial location like Mare Island is the amazing mixture of lighting sources. Though it wasn’t much of an influence on this night, the full moon can provide light that is color balanced pretty much like daylight… only a lot dimmer. The sodium vapor lamps that light this area (they are common in street lamps) produce a strongly yellow or yellow/red light. Occasional fluorescent or tungsten lamps provide yet more color variations. In the end, it is just about impossible to say what kind of color balance is “real” – and doubly-so since the actual shooting conditions are near darkness. The only reason that images like this look daylight-bright is because they are typically the result of long exposures. In fact, this one was relatively short at just over a minute. Somewhere in the 2 to 5 minute range is perhaps more typical.

The crazy lighting is apparent in this image if you look a bit more closely. As mentioned above, there is cross lighting here from both sides of the frame. While the strongest light comes from the left (and creates that UFO shadow) there is also significant light from a bit further away to the right. You may also be able to see that the in some areas the shadows created by light from one side are filled in by garishly colored lights coming from the other directions – see some of the very yellow areas along the sides of vertical boards and along the ridges of the corrugated wall.

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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: Cascades, Photographs: Nature

Roots and Rocks

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Roots and Rocks
Roots and Rocks

Roots and Rocks. Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington. August 28, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Weathered tree roots stretch across boulders at Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington.

I made this photograph at our first stop after we arrived at the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. (Technically, that isn’t quite true, since we had earlier stopped at the “ranger station” to ask some questions, but this was the first “real” stop for photography.) The road into this area twists and turns as it ascends toward and then past a ski area, and here we couldn’t help but pull over at a hairpin curve that provided a panoramic overlook to the valley below and the ridges to the east (?) of our position. Although the original reason for stopping was this dramatic view, I soon found nearby “intimate landscapes” to also be very interesting. While I often hike and climb long distances to find my photographs… for this one the tripod was on asphalt and the subject right next to the road.

On a technical note, for this photograph I used a lens that I’m increasingly fond of for photographing subjects like this one, the Canon EF 70-200mm f/4 L USM (link to B&H). I find it useful to be able to put a bit of distance between myself and subjects in which the entire image may include only a few square feet, and the ability to fine tune the composition with the zoom is very useful. Although I didn’t do it in this photography, working with a slightly longer focal length also lets me have the option of isolating the subject against an out of focus background. I have the non-IS version of the lens – because that was the only version available back when I got mine – though I would almost certainly get the IS version if I were to replace it.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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