Posts in Category: flowers
8/18/2009
Pumpkin Flower
I leave for England and the British Birding Fair, where I will be assisting Zeiss UK with the Digiscoping Stand, attending meetings, etc. I am posting a few ahead here so you might not notice my absence.
This is from a growing set of images from around my yard in Kennebunk. Our yard is nothing special. We are casual landscapers and gardeners at best. But we do have pumpkin plants. They are unlikely to make pumpkins here inside the tide line where the season is short even by southern Maine standards, but they are great plants…with great flowers.
This was taken with the super macro on my little Sanyo dual HD camcorder and 10mp still camera. It does a not half bad job. As you might guess, the camera was right down inside the large flower to take this shot.
Sanyo VPC GG 10 at it’s 40mm equivalent widest setting and macro. F3.5 @ 1/280th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Just my basic added Clarity, Vibrance, and sharpen in Lighroom.
8/17/2009
Mature Indian Pipe Flower
I have seen Indian Pipe at this stage of development, and photographed it here at Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge…it was pinker last year…but somehow I never looked inside the blossom. Indian Pipe begins well drooped over on its stalk and only goes erect as the blossom matures. Inside, as you can see, are all the flower parts. I think these are actually beginning to form seeds.
Indian Pipe is often thought of as fungus…deriving nutrients from decomposing plant matter…but it is actually a fungal symbiont, taking its nutrients from the fungus it is associated with. Generally symbiont provide sugars from photosynthesis in exchange for the minerals they get from the fungus, but the Indian Pipe actually robs the fungus of sugars it got from another symbiont in exchange for minerals. More parasite that symbiont, when you come right down to it.
This shot was taken right down to it too…using the flip out LCD on the H50 at ground level.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F3.2 @ 1/40th @ ISO 200. Programed auto.
In Lightroom, cropped a bit for a tighter view. Mild Recovery for the white of the flower. Blackpoint to the right. Added Clarity and Vibrance, and Landscape sharpen.
This is a view of a pair of fully mature flowers from straight above.
Indian Pipe from Straight Up
8/14/2009
A Matter of Perspective: Yellow
The house is actually across the river behind the beach which this high dune separates from the inflow of a smaller creek. The yellow flowers just cried out to be the subject though, and the angle makes it an interesting shot (imho).
Sony DSC H50 at full wide. F5.6@ 1/500th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Just my basic added Clarity and Vibrance and Landscape sharpen, with some added Contrast as well. I used a Graduated Filter effect from the top to darken the sky, and the vignetting tool to lighten the corners of the image.
8/8/2009
In the Heart of the Rose
Macros always provide a striking view. Somehow the most ordinary objects become interesting when seen at larger than life size from an uncommon distance. With some things…flowers in particular…macros reveal shape and form we normally overlook. This shot was taken from centimeters away, with the camera lens actually down inside the flower. It was early evening, and the light was soft. The hardest part was selecting the point of focus. With a shot like this, it has to be the stamens, otherwise the whole shot looks out of focus. If the stamens are sharp we can tolerate some softness in the petals.
Sanyo VPC CG10 at about 38mm equivalent. F3.5 @ 1/40th @ ISO 50. Programed auto.
Just basic added Vibrance and Clarity and Landscape sharpen preset in Lightroom.
From The Yard, Kennebunk ME.
8/1/2009
Indian Pipe: Rachel Carson NWR
While at Rachel Carson that misty day from yesterday’s image, I took one picture with the H50 and when I tried to take another it said the memory was full. Of course, I had left the card in the computer at home. It was almost a half hour before I remembered that I had another card in my bag, and during that half hour I was shooting with my little Sanyo dual HD video and 10mp still camera. This shot was taken in macro mode eye to eye with the Indian Pipe using the flip out LCD, much as I would have on the H50. And it is pretty good. I might have gotten slightly better overall image quality with the H50, but this will do, thank you very much. You might not have noticed it was not an H50 shot if I had not told you.
Sanyo VPC CG10 at about 40mm equivalent and macro, manual focus. F3.5 @ 1/40th @ ISO 50. Programed auto.
In Lightroom, my normal added Clarity and Vibrance. Blackpoint considerably to the right on this camera, and some added Contrast as well. Landscape sharpen preset. Some noise reduction, both luminance and color, to tame the CMOS mottling.
From Around Home Kennebunk ME.
7/30/2009
Happy and Foamy by the Sea
A spike of Meadowsweet among the reeds a few yards from the rocky edge of the ocean. Looks cheerful to me.
This is one of those where I flipped out the LCD and held the camera at arms’ length to frame the shot with wide-angle macro.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F5.6 @ 1/500th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Just the basic added Vibrance and Clarity and sharpen in Lightroom.
From Around Home Kennebunk ME.
7/29/2009
Elephant Head?
I don’t actually know if Elephant’s Head is what these tiny flowers are called. Tiny? The open blossom is less then 1/4 inch across. This is another shot from Rachel Carson NWR, taken along the mile loop of trail…a loop that rarely disappoints photographically.
I took this shot from ground level, using the flip out LCD of the H50 and pointing the camera up under the blooms. From above the large pistol of the plant is not obvious, but from this angle it dominates.
Of course the bokeh is almost as interesting as the plant itself.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F2.7 @ 1/40th @ ISO 160. Programed auto.
Cropped from the right in Lightroom for composition. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Landscape sharpen. I used some Recovery for the background.
From Around Home Kennebunk ME.
7/24/2001
Jack
A small stand of Jack in the Pulpit at Coastal Maine Botanical Garden. Getting late in the afternoon. Plants in shadow but with sun on the ground and plants behind them. Not an easy shot. Also they were deep in a bed with a boarder, so I could not get very close.
This shot was taken right down on ground level with the LCD flipped out and at full zoom to frame the single bloom. This had the advantage of throwing the background well out of focus and creating some interesting bokeh. A shot like this is only possible hand held due to the H50s excellent image stabalization. It is not that the shutter speed was too slow for hand holding…it is that with the long zoom and bending low for the shot…I am just not that stable.
Sony DSC H50 at full zoom (465mm equivalent). F4.0 @ 1/200th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Clearly a shot like this with high dynamic range and the light behind the subject is going to take both careful exposure and some post processing. I have come to trust the H50’s auto exposure system to the extent that I rarely second guess it…and then too, I know what I can do in Lightroom. I used heavy Recovery for the highlights behind the flower, and added Fill Light to bring up color and detail in the bloom itself. Blackpoint to the right to bring out the intensity. I had already used the Punch preset which adds Clarity and Vibrance. Landscape sharpen preset.
The result is even better than I envisioned at the time. I think anyway.
7/23/2009
Daisy Riot
From the serenity of the Azalea garden to the riot of the massed Daises. This low angle shot emphasizes the riot.
To take it I actually submerged the camera in the patch (gently gently so as not to bruise a stem) and used the flip out LCD for composition. This is right a the edge of the acceptable depth of field, with foreground flowers going just a bit soft, but the eye is pulled up to the dancing flower in the center and the image works overall. I think.
Given another chance at it I would have used program shift for a smaller aperture, but since the H50 only goes to F8, at this distance, it probably would not have helped much.
Sony DSC H50 at full wide and macro. F5.0 @ 1/1000th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Cropped from left and right in Lightroom for composition. Punch and Sharpen presets.
A higher angle view…but in my opinion, it lacks the energy of the low angle.
Daisy Riot from Above
Still from the Coastal Maine Botanical Garden gallery.
7/22/2009
Iris Against the Fall
The Azalea garden at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens is the oldest part of the grounds. Built in 2001, the plants on the terraced hill are just coming into their own, and were well past bloom when we visited. The water feature however is one the most stunning landscape sculptures I have ever seen. Water cascades down over a number of ledges and then sheets off a final carefully placed shelf in a rippling curtain of water that is surely designed to catch the light in a million different ways. There is then a short run to a lily pond, surrounded this season with Iris. Beautiful.
I used moderate tel on the zoom to frame this shot from a distance, and Program Shift to select the smallest aperture (greatest depth of field) and a slow shutter speed for the falling water. It was cropped from both the left and right in Lightroom for composition.
Sony DSC H50 at about 120mm equivalent. F8.0 @ 1/50th @ ISO 100. Programed auto with program shift.
Punch and Landscape sharpen presets in Lightroom. Recovery for the highlights. The rock at the bottom right was still too bright, so I used the Local Adjustment Brush to paint a mask and reduce brightness where needed.
The alternative view…
Iris And the Fall
For this, I zoomed in to about 300mm equivalent, and then cropped in Lightroom to come in even tighter, and to place the Iris on the power line (rule of thirds). No Program Shift here. I let the camera set moderate aperture and a faster shutter speed.
F4.0 @ 1/200th @ ISO 100. Programed auto.
Only Punch and Sharpen in Lightroom.