The other day I posted some photos of the grounds of Werribee Mansion. A. and I really enjoyed exploring the old greenhouses that sat close to the flower beds, and the various lighting that the place offered made for some interesting portraits as well. These are some of those images.
Flowers and photography.
Let’s face it: A total cliche.
But such a tempting one. They stand still. You can take as long as you like to frame them up to get the shot you want. They’re generally not far from your front door, so you don’t have to travel far. They’ve got interesting and attractive shapes. And they’re so colourful. So it’s hard to overcome the drive.
It’s hard to be original with flower photography, of course. Namely because there’s such a plethora of photographers with macro lenses lining up at the nearest flower-bed. It’s all been done. Abstracts. Extreme close-ups. Shallow depth-of-field. Basically, if you’ve got the right kit and the patience, you too can take a technically excellent but artistically unremarkable flower photograph.
Forgive my little spin of sarcasm. There are some beautiful flower photos out there. Hunt around on flickr, for one, and you can find some exceptional examples. Or, of course, National Geographic. They’re just hard to find amidst all the other hack photographers (like me) happy-snapping their way around the botanical gardens.
My handful of offerings below are nothing special or unique. I’m guilty of all the above criticisms. Not an original image in the set. But, one way or another, they’re pictures of flowers I find somehow visually satisfying. Perhaps it’s the way in which early-morning contrast throws background into near-darkness, leaving the subject framed in sunlight. Maybe it’s the way repeating shapes and colours slowly fade out of sharpness with a wide aperture. It could be the delicate splash of intense colour against an otherwise plain background, or the satisfying hit of fractal biology writ large across the frame. I guess that somewhere in our make-up- whether it’s the legacy of an evolution that once saw us sharing a common ancestor with bees, or some gift of a Creator who wants us to enjoy the beauty of the universe- flowers just work for us.
So I hope you enjoy these ones.
A follow-on post from the set of pictures I put up on Tuesday from a photoshoot with my housemate’s extremely adorable 7-month-old kitten, Kirk.
I’ll let the photos do the talking here (for a change…)
A few months back my housemate got a kitten. He’s a ragdoll and he’s called Kirk. Some of you enjoyed the photos I posted of him back then, when he was thirteen weeks old. He’s now about seven months old, and I figured it was high time to share some more photos.
Also, some people (I’m looking at you, @ShoesfromthHood) have been gently implying they would like to see more photos of Kirk teh Kitteh. So you can consider this my contribution to the #1millionkittens campaign.
I am expecting cupcakes.
And in all seriousness, he’s such a darn cute little thing to look at that I just couldn’t resist. So I went out and had a little play with Kirk in the garden yesterday afternoon. As a ragdoll he’s supposed to be an indoor cat, but he’s okay to play in the fenced back yard (as long as he doesn’t realise he can climb the gate).
Comments on the somewhat wild nature of our back garden are not required. I like to think of it as our very own Carbon Sink.
It was a long way from the easiest shoot I’ve ever done. I used my Canon EF 85mm f/1.8, one of my favourite lenses and which I adore shooting with, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere. It rocks my world when it comes to portraiture, and that crisp, shallow depth of field and huge aperture make it a joy to shoot with.
(A reminder to the non-photo-literate readers among you, ‘depth-of-field’ relates to the amount of the image, front to back (depth) either side of the point you are actually focusing on that is in focus. Shallow depth of field means that only a small amount of the photo either side of that point of focus is sharp, which is the technique which gives those pleasing-looking portraits where the subject’s face is nicely in focus but the background is all smooth and blurry).
The downside to shooting at such a shallow depth of field is that if you get your point of focus even slightly off, the bit of your photo that you want in focus, is no longer in focus. This is a challenge even at the best of times taking portraits. When you are dealing with a seven-month-old kitten which has an attention span of a fruit-fly on speed, this is a task not entirely different from trying to hit a sheet of paper with a dart, side-on, while riding a mechanical bull.
Using a variety of tricks, cajoling, and abuse (it’s a good thing Kirk’s too young to understand cuss-words) I did manage to get his attention enough times to get a handful of shots I was pretty pleased with, and which I feel capture both his beauty (he is one gorgeous-looking cat) and his cheeky, resilient and adventurous spirit.
I’ll post the second tranche of these photos on Thursday to keep the variety up. After all, I’d hate to overwhelm you with kitten cuteness.
Click some of the shots for a larger version…
Victoria’s drought is no secret. Since I got back to Melbourne in late December, the state has averaged less than about 2cm (1 inch) of rain. Our water storages are at about 30%, 5% lower than the same period last year, and dropping at a rate of about 0.5% per week. It’s the lowest level displayed on the record, which starts in 1997, but as far as I know we’ve never been this low before. We’re in stage 3a water restrictions, and gardens are dying out across the state. Flying in to Melbourne airport, the landscape is yellow-brown from horizon to horizon.
The morning after Mike & Lisa’s wedding in sub-tropical New South Wales was mild and damp, and a wet grey rain fell in a refreshing shower that hissed on vibrant green leaves and left the atmosphere singing with moist droplets. For this Victorian, it was like taking a deep breath of cool, clean air. Invigorating and nostalgic. How we could do with a nice downpour here in Melbourne…
Sometimes the fun is in finding the beauty in plain, every day objects. Like a wooden birdtable. This one is in my parents’ garden, taken before Christmas (when things weren’t quite so dry and yellow…). I really like the streaks of cloud in that rich blue sky, the strong greens, the sharp linear frame of the wooden structure versus the soft vegetation, and the play of afternoon light on the angles.
This was one of the first shots I took with my Canon EOS 5D, that most beautiful of technological creations. I was getting used to having a DSLR in my hands after nine months of messing around with my trusty but limited Canon Powershot G9. Shooting full-frame on a wide-angle lens is something special- I’ve got some posts lined up from my new Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8, which is one spectacular piece of glass.
Sorry I haven’t posted much in the last week or so. I’ve been working most nights up to 11.30 and later, and things have been a bit hectic. Hoping that’ll settled down for the next couple of weeks and I’ll try and have some more images up. I’m still clocking them up faster than I can post, there’s hundreds yet to come… ;o)
I had the privilege of attending the wedding of two dear friends of mine not long ago, Mike and Lisa, a few photos of which may appear at some point in the future. Both Mike and Lisa are global nomads like myself. Mike, a friend of several years, and I shared a house last year in Papua New Guinea. I met Lisa face-to-face for the first time two days before the wedding, but we had been corresponding for eight months and already struck up a good friendship. I share many things in common with both of them, not least among which being a love for travel and for writing.
They got married in the garden of Lisa’s parents house on a hillside behind the sleepy seaside town of Ballina, in northern New South Wales. The view was spectacular, and the weather just perfect for an outdoors wedding. From a photographic perspective, one of my favourite features was this view across the ridgeline to a lone tree standing in an empty adjacent field. With the garden flowers in the foreground (I love Frangipani) and the afternoon light, I took several snaps of this vista. In this particular shot I’ve used a shallow depth of field and focussed nice and close to the lens so that the tree behind is thrown into a faint blur- still clear enough to show what it is, but indistinct enough that the emphasis is on its form and the lighting, rather than any particular details.
Just playing, really.
