G Dan Mitchell | Photography

Andy Frazer has posted a couple of interesting stories/links:

1. Tim Baskerville of The Nocturnes is presenting a Night Photography Workshop next month. I’ve been to several events organized by Tim, so I’ll join Andy in recommending this one to anyone looking to get started on night photography.
2. Andy also calls out the night photography of Frank Relle whose work features photographs from New Orleans, especially post-Katrina New Orleans.

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.11.2008 :: Commentary :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Fred Larson does a daily Mystical Photography blog for SF Gate which features photographs of Bay Area subjects. (For obvious reasons, I understand the effort it must take for him to come up with a photo of these subjects every day of the year… ;-) Sometimes Fred comes up with a shot that is really unique, and this photograph of an egret is certainly in that category.

(His blog has a RSS feed.)

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.11.2008 :: Photographers :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Titus Canyon. Death Valley National Park, California. April 3, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell - all rights reserved.

Black and white photograph of Titus Canyon, Death Valley National Park.

This was, to say the least, a difficult shot. Besides driving nearly 30 miles on dirt roads, there were photographic challenges, not the least of which is the extreme dynamic contrast between the very bright sky and the dark canyon walls. Needless to say, this photograph is the result of some significant post-processing work - but do click the image to view it larger.

The road through Titus Canyon is one of the most amazing features of any Western US National Park. (Shhh….) It begins on a rather typical high desert dirt road through sagebrush country but then ascends into the Amargosa range. Before long this narrow one-way track twists and turns up and down steep ridges past amazing rocky ridges and along the top of tremendous canyons - while not a true four-wheel drive road, it is not for the faint hearted. It then descends into Titus Canyon itself, and near the bottom it passes through an unbelievable slot canyon - in places barely wider than your car the canyon walls rise vertically for hundreds of feet above. (If you visit Titus Canyon, check with the park service first since road conditions are very rough and can change.)

keywords: titus, canyon, road, cliff, rocks, sky, clouds, trees, bushes, plants, desert, grapevine, mountains, landscape, scenic, travel, drive, california, usa, death valley, national park, stock, curve, black and white

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.11.2008 :: Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Jim M. Goldstein must be in an Alaska frame of mind this week - I see he posted again on this topic. The more recent post reminded me of a couple of interesting things about Alaska photography, regarding the light in particular - not that there aren’t scores of other things also worth mentioning.

Near the summer solstice the days are extremely long no matter where you are in Alaska. While the daylight is continuous above the arctic circle, even further south it is light almost all the time. The first time I visited I was accompanying a couple of my kids on a week long backpacking trip with a school group. We flew into Juneau and camped at a lake very close to a glacier. (That’s another thing that is different in Alaska - our camp site was within hailing distance of a huge glacier… but we could also send someone down the road a few miles the other way to pick up pizzas. :-) The next morning the kids were trying to figure out if it ever got dark. “I was up at 11:30 and it wasn’t dark. How about you?” “I was up at 1:00 a.m and there was light. Anyone up at midnight?” In the end, while it got “darker,” it never got dark. Later, I was out in Skagway in the middle of the “night” and it was more like dark twilight.

All of this means a couple of interesting things for photographers.

First, you’ll have more shooting time than you can probably handle. When it is light for 21 or 22 hours per day you’ll likely end up completely exhausted if you shoot the way you would at lower latitudes.

(A non-photographic story: We hiked over the Chilcoot Pass one day. We got up at 3:00 a.m., but this wasn’t the problem you might imagine. Sure, it was early, but the sun was already up and it didn’t feel like 3:00 in the morning. We got up, quickly ate and packed, and hiked for hours. I think we crossed the pass sometime in the middle of the morning. After killing a lot of time on the pass we finally headed down the other side, stopping along the way for lunch and general trailside stuff. We finally encountered one of the camping huts on the Canadian side and pause there for awhile. We moved on and arrived at our intended camp near a lake. We began to set up but were informed by a Canadian ranger than his “clients” would need our campsites. Hmmm. We went ahead and spent a couple hours more here fixing dinner, repacked, and headed on down the trail 3 or 4 more miles to another campsite. Here we finally set up camp and I recall finally finishing my day at 10:00 p.m…. with the sun still in the sky!)

Second… what amazing light! While the days are very long, the sun never gets all that high in the sky. The sun doesn’t “rise” as much as “rotate” around you. Consequently “golden hour” light goes on and on and on for hours and hours. Perhaps “drunk on light” might describe your reaction to this.

Finally, an illustrative story from a conversation I had at Beaver Creek near the Yukon/Alaska border. We had come in late in the day after riding through scattered thunder showers. Rather than camp we decided to get “hostel” rooms. In the evening we were hanging out in the lodge and I remember asking one of the locals about the weather. The answer was, more or less, “thundershowers in the evening, but the sun should be out by midnight.” He was right - the sun came out at about 11:30.

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.10.2008 :: Commentary :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Rhyolite School Windows, Amargosa Range. Rhyolite, Nevada. April 2, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell - all rights reserved.

Black and white photograph of the Amargosa Range as seen through the windows of the abandoned school in the ghost town of Rhyolite Nevada. While the ghost town of Rhyolite is in Nevada, the eastern border of Death Valley National Park, including the Amargosa Range, is nearby and visible from here.

keywords: rhyolite, school, abandoned, ghost, town, windows, wall, amargosa, range, mountains, desert, nevada, usa, death valley, national park, black and white, ruins, historic, scenic, travel, landscape, stock

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.10.2008 :: Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Structures :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Rhyolite School. Rhyolite, Nevada. April 2, 2004. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell - all rights reserved.

Wide angle photograph of the ruins of the Rhyolite School exterior at dawn. While the strong walls of this building are still standing, the roof and interior fittings are all gone.

keywords: rhyolite, school, building, doors, windows, walls, grafitti, blue, sky, clouds, perspective, concrete, ruins, abandoned, ghost, town, mining, mines, nevada, usa, travel, scenic, structures, death valley, national park, sunrise, morning, dawn, stock

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.09.2008 :: Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Structures :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

… and succeeding. :-)

Photographer Jim M. Goldstein has posted a piece at his blog about his visit to Caribou Pass Valley in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. While I’ve been to Alaska a couple of times (for a total of about a month) I’ve never been that far north, and on my visits I was not equipped to do serious photography.

(About the “that far north” observation… On my most recent Alaska trip I rode my bike - along with a group of students - 1100 miles from Skagway through the Yukon to Fairbanks and then to Anchorage. Really.)

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.08.2008 :: Commentary, Photographers :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Rhyolite Ghost Town Ruins, Dawn. Rhyolite, Nevada. April 2, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell - all rights reserved.

Dawn at the ruins of the ghost town of Rhyolite, Nevada. The remnants of one of the town banks is in the foreground, and the school building is seen in the distance. Beyond is the Amargosa Valley and the Amargosa Range in Death Valley National Park.

This photograph was made during a brief interval when the light went from rather flat and dull to lighter and warm as the sun briefly shone through the high overcast.

keywords: dawn, sunrise, ghost, town, rhyolite, nevada, usa, mine, mining, ruins, abandoned, bank, school, sky, clouds, vault, door, columns, desert, mountains, sky, clouds, historic, travel, scenic, landscape, stock, walls, ridge, hills

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.08.2008 :: Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Structures :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Window on the Desert, Rhyolite School. Rhyolite, Nevada. April 2, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell - all rights reserved.

Looking through a window in the Rhyolite School ruins towards the distant desert. Rhyolite is an abandoned ghost town, and this school building is largely in ruins.

While Rhyolite and this school building are not in Death Valley National Park, they are part of the greater Death Valley area. The terrain visible through the window in the photo is the Amargosa Valley and Amargosa Range beyond, both of which are in the eastern section of the park.

keywords: window, desert, rhyolite, school, ghost town, mining, mine, abandoned, ruins, walls, nevada, historic, usa, travel, scenic, sill, structure, stock

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.07.2008 :: Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Structures :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)

Bank Building Ruins. Rhyolite, Nevada. April 2, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell - all rights reserved.

Distorted wide angle perspective photograph of the ruins of the bank building in the ghost town of Rhyolite, Nevada.

I spent considerable time shooting the remains of this bank building. Given how impressive it is today even in its deteriorating state, it must have been quite a building 100 years ago.

keywords: distorted, wide angle, perspective, bank, building, structure, ruins, abandoned, rhyolite, ghost, town, sidewalk, columns, concrete, steps, sky, clouds, nevada, usa, travel, historic, stock, windows

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G Dan Mitchell :: May.06.2008 :: Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Structures :: No Comments » (Join the site to leave a comment.)