29 Jul 13. With a weekend of lovely weather, and lots of activities going on in the greater community, it was a perfect setting for taking advantage of some of the flora offerings. We visited one arts and crafts fair which I'll write about later in the week and followed that up with a visit to one of our two favorite nurseries, one close enough that we could walk if we were certain we wouldn't be purchasing something, an experience we've yet to encounter. Not having time to work over any of the weekend stuff, this shot is from a couple weeks back taken in the same garden where I shot the humming bird. This little gal was hard at work and spent the better part of a full minute working over this particular daisy. Not sure what this blossom offered over the others, but she was intent on going over it several times before moving on to another flower. This shot could be cropped a bit tighter if you like, but my intent was to showcase both the entirety of the flower as well as the bee. I've added just a small amount of structure enhancement in addition to the cropping, otherwise, it is pretty much as the camera captured it. Nikon D300s; 18 - 200; Aperture Priority; ISO 200; 1/1250 sec @ f / 7.1.
30 Jul 13. A very simple and straight forward B&W for this week's submission. At the end of the road into Deer Park resides a series of camping sites, some for campers, some for tenters, but nothing for the larger vehicles. Several of the sites were in use when we finally arrived, but there were more open than occupied, which I found somewhat surprising. While we found the drive to not be worth it on that visit, I'm thinking it just might be now that I know what to expect and how to better approach the visit. The problem I see in so doing is that it might take a couple of visits to get to that point and it is a bit of a pain to get there. But the potential is seemingly great, based on just what we did see on that very brief visit. At the spot where we turned around to return home, the site of that painting image I sent earlier, the view is what I'm sharing today. It being a monochrome image, you'll have to imagine the deep blue sky, vivid greens in the foreground, and brown to white trees. And a bit of a white moon to boot. If I had taken the time to get out of the vehicle and wander around, I'm rather certain there were views that would be even more spectacular. So my gut feeling is that I'll wind up, sooner or later, giving it another go. And I'll wager all of you who have been there prior are going to say "yes, you should give it another chance." Perhaps this fall will be that time. Nikon D300s; 18 - 200; Aperture Priority; ISO 200; 1/500 sec @ f / 9.
31 Jul 13. Our local nursery has a section dedicated to evergreens, with several of the species generally bearing cones. I like to play with the portions of the branches holding the cones, generally for both perspective and texture exercises. In the example for today, I thought it might be fun to try something different and play with color as the primary ingredient. This image is comprised almost entirely of yellow (bright), green (dark), and brown (medium) tones. My goal was to emphasize the cones without giving them some texture accent which I know would draw your attention to them immediately. With the composition such as it is, your eye will naturally want to go to the center of the image, but I want it to go to the periphery and look at the cones. This is a bit of a challenge as bright colors tend to project forward and darker ones recede. The cones, being darker than the needles on the branch, tend to recede and the branch move forward, but, by putting the branch slightly out of focus and the cones sharply in focus, that tendency should be overcome by the area of interest being that portion that is sharpest. This works for my vision, but, as I am the one creating it, I may not be the best judge of success in this instance. You look at it and decide if I was successful or not. I'll be curious to hear what you have to say. Nikon D300s; 18 - 200; Aperture Priority; ISO 200; 1/2000 sec @ f / 7.1.
