Tag Archives: yellow

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

Man With Cell Phone, Maroon Wall

March 12, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 1 Comment

A man with a cell phone walks along a San Francisco sidewalk past maroon wall.

For the first time, I went out and did street photography with my two sons in San Francisco during the first weekend in March. It was fun, though I’m not used to shooting street (or much else) with other people, and I think my work habits may have a tendency to drive others slightly crazy. (Sons, thanks for putting up with me! :-) When I shoot street and urban subjects I tend to wander about rather slowly, looking at everything, getting distracted while I stop to shoot something, and then heading off in an unpredictable direction when something else catches my attention!

We took BART to the downtown area of the City and wandered up toward Union Square along with the rest of the horde, finally heading out into some less traveled streets where there weren’t quite so many people. We photographed various back streets and then descended through the fringes of the Tenderloin to end up at the Civic Center.

One irony is that while I am fully digital these days – though I did go with the traditional approach and shoot with only a 50mm prime – both of my sons prefer to shoot film now! There is no explaining some things! :-)

When I shoot street I tend to approach it somewhat as a landscape photographer, first looking for interesting light, patterns, colors, and so forth. At that point I often square up a composition and then look for the right person or people to walk through the scene, and I try to time the exposure to put the figure in an interesting place in the composition. In this case I think it got quite lucky with the colors of the fellow’s clothing against the maroon wall!

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.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM
ISO 200, f/11, 1/100 second

keywords: man, person, walking, cell, phone, talking, maroon, yellow, tan, arch, circle, patterns, window, reflection, fire, alarm, parking, meter, sidewalk, manhole, cover, design, gate, door, vent, address, hill, slope, san francisco, california, usa, north america, street, urban, downtown, city, stock

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

Powerplant, Railroad Avenue – Mare Island Naval Shipyard

March 7, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Night panoramic photograph of the powerplant building and other structures along Railroad Avenue at the historic Mare Island Naval Shipyard, Vallejo, California.

This is a bit of a first for me – a night photography stitched panorama. This image is composed of two separate exposures which were aligned and “stitched” into a single image in post. (As such, it could be a very large print!) Shooting from an elevated position, I shot almost directly north (as you can tell from the star trails in the larger version). The view looks up Railroad Avenue past the iconic power plant building with its smokestack that is visible from all over Mare Island.

I’m usually a bit casual about exposure time with long exposure night photographs. It isn’t that I don’t care – it is just that one has a ton of leeway when it comes to the very long exposures I typically use. For example, on a 3 minute exposure you would have to be off by three minutes to overexpose by one stop! So rather than use a stopwatch or an automatic timer I just count to myself. I’m usually will within a 10% error, and that is good enough. However, when stitching “good enough” often isn’t. The separate component frames really need to be quite similar, so in this case I resorted to using my watch to get relatively accurate 90 second exposures.

Another interesting factor in night photography is illustrated in this photo, namely the wildly varied colors of the light sources we deal with. There are three dominant sources in this image. The overall illumination comes from the full moon, which is quite similar to day light in terms of white balance. On the near wall of the brick power plant there is very “hot” and saturated yellow/red tinted light, probably from sodium vapor lamps. Near the left end of the image is an old wooden building that is illuminated by very green light, which I believe comes from mercury vapor lamps. I often chuckle a bit when people speak of “white balancing” the color in a scene like this. If you pick one source for your white balance you’ll throw the others even more out of line. My philosophy is usually to just go with what looks right!

Finally, the idea of making the stitched panorama came from the recently started Panocturnists web site, begun by people connected with The Nocturnes, the San Francisco Bay Area night photography group. I was intrigued by the idea of creating panoramic night photography, and I’ve done a few images along these lines on my two most recent visits to Mare Island.

(More of my Mare Island photographs)

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.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM
ISO 200, f/8, 90 seconds

keywords: powerplant, building, structure, railroad, avenue, street, track, asphalt, sky, dark, night, photography, star, trail, color, light, yellow, red, blue, smoke, stack, cyclone, fence, brick, glow, panorama, panocturnes, minsy, san francisco bay area, window, antenna, vallejo, california, usa, north america, mare, island, naval, shipyard, stock

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

Wall and Signs, The Mission

March 2, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Brightly colored yellow and blue wall with red and white sign and restaurant window with food photographs, The Mission, San Francisco, California.

Another photograph of the subject I posted earlier – some very colorfully painted walls in the Mission District of San Francisco. While the previous one was a tighter crop in “landscape” orientation, I composed this one to show more of the vertical lines and to include the window-posted menu on the right side. Kind of makes me hungry just to look at 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.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM
ISO 200, f/8, 1/30 second

keywords: the, mission, san francisco, california, usa, north america, street, urban, city, wooden, wall, yellow, blue, paint, sign, gorda, red, white, mexican, food, photo, picture, window, menu, enchiladas, verde, tostadas, special, omelette, rojas, huevos, con, chorizo, rancheros, stripe, structure, graphic, vertical, shadow, trim, architecture, structure, stock

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

Brightly Painted Wall, Mission District

March 1, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Detail of a brightly painted red, yellow, blue, and white wall in San Francisco’s Mission District.

One sub-category of my photography focuses on businesses and shops and so forth that are not cookie-cutter chains. I love the way that these businesses seem to collect their own character over time, and I also like the wild and diverse ways that small business owners present themselves. I spotted this wild conjunction of brightly painted colors as I walked along 24th street in the Mission District of San Francisco on a Sunday afternoon. In this version of the photograph (yes, there is another) I framed a small section of the building wall closely to try to fill the frame with these colors.

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.

Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM
ISO 200, f/8, 1/25 second

keywords: the, mission, san francisco, california, usa, north america, street, urban, city, texture, pattern, stripe, line, red, yellow, white, red, vertical, bright, painted, paint, district, 24th, wall, wood, city, stock, color, primary, reflection

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