Thistles ll

Sometimes i get excited, actually a lot of times, about an image i made or am making. This is in the, or is that a, process and i'm liking what's coming out:

Perhaps i've mentioned that to get details at such a close distance requires 'stack focusing' which i now hearing is beginning to be built into cameras. The usually way is to take a series of shots, each one in a slight different plane of focus which, when combined/stacked, will yield a depth of field (DOF) that is much greater than a single image can produce. Perhaps an example will help those who don't work with macro photography:

The top image is the first of 21 shots and the bottom image is the final image. You can see that the top image has some sharpness on the closes tips of the of the thistle and the bottom image has sharpness on the furtherest leaves and there are 19 incremental images in between these two that are put on top of each other (hence, stacking) and then the software melds them together creating a single image. And if all goes well, it is sharp - like this:

And there you have it: a mini-lesson in focus-stacking.

Thistles

I have been photographing a thistle that is growing along side of the house. Its beautiful and the neighbors said it was a weed. I've heard that before but know that a weed is any plant you don't want growing 'there'. As i'm happy with the thistle and its beautiful colors, its as good as anything i've planted - however, the needles are very sharp and pierce even my heavy gloves; i'm very careful with it.

Sometimes they host guests

 As the plant is a couple weeks old, it is beginning to fade so i pruned it -this is the unpruned shot- with the idea it'll last longer and grown new blooms; time will tell. The whole plant looks likes this:

It feels like i've just begun to work on the photographic portrait of this plant ... we'll see together where it leads.

Porch Tomatoes

I have been doing more shooting around the house, literally, and enjoying a kind of photography that i don't do so often which is more journalistic then i usually care for. For journalistic styles to work, the photographs (so i understand and that may be more of what i'm struggling with then the actual photographs themselves) have to tell a story in 2 or three images otherwise, there is no story just some photographs sorta hanging out in the air with the viewer wondering why the photographer shot that image.

So, these two images:

which i rather like as they are rich in color and the dripping leaves makes me a bit cooler as i can tell it is early morning. The new tomatoes with their blooms still hanging around gives me a sense of the impending growth that is happening. And the second image - yum.

In fact, an hour ago i harvested all the red tomatoes, and the orangish one that had turned red by this morning, and they are downstairs waiting to be tasted.

Bird Sculpture

This post is less about photography then it is about place & art.

In Jan of this year (2017) we drove from the San Francisco Bay Area to Asheville, NC. While i didn't do much shooting on the way as we didn't really want to stop while i fussed around with cameras, lens, etc.. Still, we stopped outside of Los Cruses, NM for what was to be a bathroom break and then we discovered this sculpture in the rest area:

Road Runner Sculpture

It was hugh; so here here an image with Susan:

While the sculpture was amazing in it size, what was more amazing was what it was made out of:

That's right: tennis shoes, computer key boards, ironing boards, crutches, etc., etc.. Wow! i could have stood there most of the day looking at the various objects it was made of ... 'cepting for the fact it was close to 100º even in Jan.

Los Cruses is 40 miles north of El Paso where i lived for three years in the late 60's and early 70's. Except for the intense heat -it was a very dry heat so stepping in the shade was an immediate relief- i love it. It was a very different place then with easy crossing to Juárez where there was good music, excellent food and many friendly shopping areas. And the surrounding country was really desert ... some of it, must of it, rolling sand dunes which i was just learning about when i move to the Bay Area.

Looking east towards Los Cruses and the Davis Mountains

I don't believe i have any photos from the time i lived in El Paso that are of the country side but now i'm interesting in looking to see how true that is. Maybe more to follow.

Friends Self-Built Home

When we finished with emptying the house in San Antonio, we left for our trip back to NC. We had been encouraged to stop by a couple's house that had arrived during the house emptying and taken a variety of items. Their house, we were told, was very unusual and almost totally built by D. So we stopped by and spent the night there. It was as unusual:

It was a beautiful visit!

Mayfly

Oh ... its been much longer then i like since i've posted here. One of the points of this blog is to use it to push my efforts/creativity in the photographic arena. To do that it is essential i post with regularity ... now!

Photographed last week, i believe this is a May Fly although after looking at the images on line i'm not so sure. If you know what this insect is, please let me know:

Mayfly

Mayfly Skeleton

As far as i could tell, it had just emerged from its exoskeleton which was only a few inches away. When i first took a photo its wings were tight against its body and as i continued to shoot, they slowly opened and the Mayfly began to move around.

This was one of the first images and it wasn't moving at this time. The top images shows it has already begun to walk around and its wings were opening upwards.

Japanese Chestnut

 

These are two photos of the Japanese Chestnut in our backyard now in full bloom.

The top image is from the upstairs window and the bottom image is from the back door. I like the clouds in the lower photograph but prefer the tree in the top photograph.

Yesterday's full moon (June '17) is the Strawberry Moon as its said this is the best time to pick strawberries. Here are two different photographs, one with the moon slightly obscuring the top portion of moon and the other also has some clouds in front of the moon which are the dark coloration on the bottom left and center.

Personally, i'm not able to tell the different between the many full moons i have photographed over the years. The full moon eclipse that occurred some years ago over the Pacific Ocean in the middle of the night has some color in the moon as it entered and left the earth's shadow ... otherwise, they all look pretty much the same to me. [and, of course, the moon doesn't really change much].