Tag Archives: surveillance

Postcard From Pandemia #1

Postcard From Pandemia #1
A bench, a wall, a warning sign, and a door in sunlight.

Postcard From Pandemia #1. © Copyright 2020 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A bench, a wall, a warning sign, and a door in sunlight.

Photography is perhaps low on the list of the world’s priorities during a pandemic, when millions are infected and tens of thousands have died so far. But the world doesn’t stop for this, and we go on doing what we do as best we can — there is really no other choice, in my view.

My ability to make photographs of the subjects I would normally focus on right now has been extremely limited since I cannot travel more than a few miles and mostly on foot. So I have been using this as an opportunity to review my archives of old images, many of which might otherwise have been permanently left behind. But I’ve also pondered how in the world to photograph this event and its effects. I’m finally starting to see some general outlines of how this might be possible. We’ll see where this leads. Stay tuned.


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 and Amazon.

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Video Surveillance

Video Surveillance
Warning sign on a doorway to an interior space, Chinatown, San Francisco

Video Surveillance. San Francisco, California. July 25, 2015. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Warning sign on a doorway to an interior space, Chinatown, San Francisco

When doing street photography I tend to “switch modes” as I photograph — one moment I might focus on people as individuals or in groups, and then my attention may shift to the “urban landscape,” the shapes and angles of the buildings and roads and sidewalks and more. At night there is always one more element, the unusual effects of artificial light on the scene. The light can be wildly diverse: Greenish from fluorescent lamps, yellow from sodium vapor, warm and saturated from tungsten, almost like daylight though perhaps cooler from LEDs, and occasionally the colors of dusk or the moon.

LED lighting, while wonderfully efficient, is not so wonderful for night photography. Since it mirrors the color balance of daylight so closely it takes away all of those color shadings. Some times it almost makes a night photograph look like day! I made this photograph shortly after I met up with a group of other photographers to walk through this section of San Francisco. At first I was focused in small things — windows, doorways, colorful business signs. As we descended one side street we passed this somewhat nondescript building, but in the nighttime light the interior glowed with an oddly colored light.


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