hot papaya

With tomorrow’s solstice and the official beginning of summer, I thought I would post this image of a relatively new coneflower introduced by my friends at Plants Nouveau, Echinacea ‘Hot Papaya’.  I found it blooming last night in the entrance garden of the Scott Arboretum.  And although I took the typical portrait shot with as much detail as my 105mm macro lens could capture at f/45, I quickly found the sultry petals luring me in for a closer look.  So I recomposed and found f/7.1 to capture enough detail that you can still infer it’s a flower, yet with a shallow enough depth of field to soften the flow… an image more reflective of the plant’s name!

something different

Recently I’ve been looking at the local landscape a little differently…  looking for a new project or focus to spark some new energy and creativity.  It’s so easy for me to find macro images, very intimate landscapes, in the suburbs of Philadelphia.  But it’s harder to find something different: different than a broad garden shot describing the planting scheme or layout of the land, different than a plant combination emphasizing texture or color contrasts, different than the soft play of light I so easily seem to find. Today I found very harsh light and remembered the possibilities of using harsh light in the stark landscapes of Death Valley.  I was fortunate to have learned some of these ways of seeing from some of the best black and white photographers of the west last fall.  And today those teachings came back to me as I was looking at this tree against the strong architecture of a campus building.  Maybe not a project, but definitely a lesson worth remembering and practicing for future possibilities.

time for slow

I was reminded again today to slow down… not by a person, but by nature herself.  An “ice event” they call these storms, causing headaches for commuters who have to drive or walk to work.  I’m one of those walkers most every day with a mile long walk to work and then back home again; a slower mode of transportation that allows me valuable creative time.  I often think of photographic opportunities, or new subject matter during these walks. One of those musings reminded me to visit a site along the Crum Creek I photographed last year in February.  So I ventured out last Sunday into the first sun we’ve had in what seems like a month.  Lots of kids and their families were enjoying some sledding on the hill of the Holly Collection slope.  But I kept my distance taking the less traveled route along the shore of the creek, sharing some footsteps with cross-country skiers from earlier in the day.  Snow covered canes of invasive-exotic weeds that line the creek in the sunnier locations gave me less than sure footing as I plunged hip deep into the snow… the joyous cry of happily airborne sledders in the distance.  But this solitude and slow snowy walk allowed me time to watch, to watch the light, to watch the patterns, and to sense the beauty of the day.  Time didn’t matter and for a moment I was drawn back to the sand dunes of Death Valley.  Yes, sand dunes of one of the hottest places in North America on a snowy January day.  The mounds of snow along the creek and the play of light over them from the forest of beech, maple and hemlock reminded me of lessons learned from watching the light in the desert.

salt crystals

Winter has definitely had her grip on eastern Pennsylvania this month.  It’s been in the 20s every night and cloudy and below freezing every day with a howling wind.  And then last night we had our first snowfall… just enough to dust the ground and cause traffic nightmares, but too late for any chance of an evening shoot after work.  So I’m inside editing tonight and it’s a good thing since it has been almost two weeks since my last post.  This dusting has definitely excited me about getting some good snowfall, frost or ice for photography.  But I may have to wait until January or February at this point as the weather is forecast to be above freezing during the day for the next week or so.  Christmas lights just might have to do for the next week while the sun fully sets before I’m off from my day job.

So I came across the image above while editing… it’s from Death Valley this fall, near the salt flats after the sun came over the horizon and side-lit the salt crystals.  Not frost or snow… but another wonder of nature.

fall colors

In preparations for my trip to Death Valley, I was playing with (learning the functions of) a rented 70-200mm lens so that I was not fumbling too much in the field with it.  I’ve been watching the transformation of the Rhus typhina colors near the underpass on route 320 and captured this abstract that represents more of what I saw than a fully focused image of this planting and cars.  I’ll be back in a couple of weeks and hope to have some beautiful images of the western part of our beautiful country to share!

refining your vision

This afternoon I’ve been editing images to a batch limit of 20 of my best to prepare for printing a portfolio that will be reviewed at an upcoming photography workshop.  This is a difficult task, editing your own work.  But it’s something very valuable.  As I was looking through past images to see if anything caught my attention, I found a color version of this image with a little more reflected sky on the top edge.  And Bruce Barnbaum’s words came back to me… review your images over and over again if something tells you that you have something there.  You might not see it today… you might not see it tomorrow.  In this case, I didn’t see it until 2 years later.  But I finally saw what I intended to share.  Not because my digital darkroom skills are much better than 2 years ago, but because my vision, my way of seeing is becoming clearer to me.

So enjoy this abstract arrangement of rocks from the shores of Jenny Lake, WY… even if it took me 2 years to share it with you.

sunset over the city

I’ve been in a state of emotional limbo this past week loosing some motivation to go out and shoot.  I know this happens on occasion to every artist, but I just cannot seem to find that spark in my usual subject matter.  So I’ve started playing with the camera… not trying to really capture anything in particular, but rather trying to capture how my spirit is feeling in my images.  This image is close to reflecting that state of conflict and retrospection that I am feeling right now.  Who knows, this might be a new body of work?

moss

Every day during the last month, I’ve walk by this beautiful tree… a moss covered oak growing along a quiet road.  The first time I saw it, I knew I had to photograph it.  And I also knew that I needed some rain to enliven the multicolored moss and lichens on its buttress.  And tonight it rained.  A beautiful soft rain perfect for capturing the mood of the tree.  This is my first attempt at a panorama, but not my last… and certainly not my last study of this marvelous tree.  Please click on the image above to view it larger rather than simply the thumbnail on this post.

sunflower smiles

At this time of year, after we’ve had weeks and weeks without much rain, the garden starts to look a little tired.  I also find myself enjoying the fruits of the harvest and becoming obsessed with food.  So last night I went in the search of some new farmland not too far from my home to potentially photograph.  And then I found them… a field of sunshine and smiles lit up across the horizon, sunflowers.  Such a happy flower.  And these were nestled in a field of other grasses and thistle. Dressed for the hot weather, I was not wearing long pants.  So tonight I will return properly attired to thoroughly explore this area and a nearby serpentine outcrop a good friend told me about today.

moon set

Last week I was busy in Champaign-Urbana, Ilinois attending an AERGC (Association of Education and Research Greenhouse Curators) meeting.  But when I arrived at the small 4 gate airport on Sunday the sky was blazing for a beautiful sunset.  I was in the heartland and the summer storms were at their peak.  It was all I could do to get checked into the hotel room and grab the camera from my bag to shoot out the 5th floor hotel room!  The next morning something woke me up quite early and I saw this amazing moon in the still cloudy sky.  I knew there would be another great opportunity in about 30 minutes for a moon set as the sunrise came into play.

The next 3 days were full of great lectures and meeting fellow greenhouse managers.  But after dinner the second night I was able to witness another wonderful display of light.  I cannot decide which of these images is my favorite, so please comment!  Darn that I packed light because my focus was the conference and didn’t bring the wide-angle… lesson learned!