Breaking the Macro Habit

When I think about making photos of flowers a Macro lens usually is what I have in mind.  A Macro

Trillium photo taken with an 80mm Macro lens

is designed to make very sharp photos while focusing up close.  When using a Macro lens and the camera on a tripod, a photographer can make some awesome photos of flowers.

Using a Macro lens for flowers might just be a habit to break.  Today I started with my 80mm Fuji Macro and added an extension tube that allowed me to be able to focus even closer.  After wandering around the yard for a while I decided to put the Macro up and get my favorite fun little lens - the Fuji 35mm f/2. 

The 35mm focal length is equivalent to a 53mm on a full-frame camera.  That means, the 35mm is my "normal lens". A scene viewed through a normal lens appears to have the same perspective as the way your eye sees it.  This is a very small lens, making it fun to carry around.  It also has a minimal focal distance of less than 14 inches.  It has a bigger depth of field, making it easier to get sharp photos without a tripod. It's a fun way to break the mold and try something new.

Here are some photos I took today using that normal lens.  They are all hand-held.  Some are cropped.  All were using the Fuji Velvia film simulation which gives them vibrant colors.

f/2.8

 The dogwood photo includes some of the background, making the pink flowers stand out.

f/3.6

f/2.8

Crop of the previous photo

f/2.8

The point of this illustration is to say we shouldn't let our photographic gear constrain our creativity.  Use a wild angle for a close-up, use a big zoom for a landscape, try using a Macro lens for portraits.  Let's use our "safer at home" time to be creative.

Exploring Our Backyard - Phipps Bend

If you've read my blog before you might remember that I am participating in a photography challenge to take at least one photo each week that meets a weekly challenge.  This week's challenge is to make a photo in your own back yard.  I did that, taking a photo of some potted plants.  On Thursday I took the challenge a little further and expanded my "back yard" to Hawkins County Tennessee and the Phipps Bend Wildlife Preserve.

Those who have lived in this area since the late seventies and early eighties will remember Phipps Bend as the site of a TVA nuclear power plant that was never completed.  The project was 40% complete when it was abandoned in 1981, leaving the skeleton of cooling tower base and a few buildings.

Abandoned Cooling Tower Base

Since then, the Phipps Bend Industrial Park has grown up next to the TVA site and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) has also created a wildlife preserve between the old site and the Holston River.  A 3-mile out and back hiking trail/gravel road snakes along parallel to the Phipps Bend in the Holston River.  This easy level hike passes by beautiful ponds, wetlands, wide grassy fields, and the river.  We were there to see and hopefully photograph some wild birds.

What we found was a beautiful area full of wildlife, flowers, and yes, some colorful birds.

Yellow Flag "Batman"  Iris

Oxeye Daisy

 With the exception of one hiker and two equestrians on horseback, we didn't see any other people.  We did see more than a dozen white-tailed deer in the tall grass and one large snapping turtle on the trail.

Can you see me?

Indigo Bunting

Orchard Oriole 

These are just a few of the photos I made on this trip.  My bird photography skills need some work and we have plans to go back next week to try again.  I am more happy with some of the other photos from this trip.  I am trying something new to share these photos.  I have made a 2:40 slide show that shows my 27 favorites from that day that tell a story.  I hope this works and you enjoy the show.

A mirror reflecting the Creator - June 2014 Calendar Page

I really like the writings of John Muir. I have found that things he said over 100 years ago are insightful and apply just as well today as they did in his time.

For those of you not familiar with Muir he was a Scottish naturalist and early (1838 - 1914) advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States.   He was known as "The Father of The National Parks" because of his efforts to convince Congress to create the National Park Service,  Yosemite and Sequoia National Parks.  During his lifetime John Muir published over 300 articles and 12 books. Ten of his books are public domain and available as free downloads.  He co-founded the Sierra Club, which helped establish a number of national parks after he died.

I have often used Muir quotes on my calendars.  One of my favorites is

"Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves."

I chose the quote for the June calendar page because it so describes the flowers in the dew drops as a "mirror reflecting the Creator".  As June and I have become more interested in nature photography we have learned to look closely at everyday objects and see God's handiwork.   In this case this was a stem on a flower in the Centennial Park in Nashville.  It had rained the night before and there were water drops everywhere.   It was easy to get caught up in the reflecting pond, flowers, and buildings, but I found this dew drop covered stem to be the best thing there that morning.

This was taken with my camera on a tripod with a 100mm macro lens attached.   I manually focused to bring the refraction of the flowers into focus.  The macro lens created a shallow Depth of Field (DOF) and blurred the same flowers below the water drops.   This is not a particularly difficult shot if you have the right equipment, patience and an eye for these little details.

A 16 x 24 inch ThinWrap print of this photo is available in the Blowfish Emporium on State Street in Bristol, Virginia.   It is a lustre print that is coated with a soft Satin Laminate. The print is then mounted on Gatorboard with the print wrapping around the edges.  A block on the back makes the print float away from the wall when mounted.  I really like ThinWraps because they are a little different, look great and don't require expensive frames.

Backing Up Photos On The Road

First day back from 12 days in Glacier National Park and Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta.  I am in the process of moving all my Glacier NP photos from the laptop that I took with me to the desktop where I do all my editing and keep all my master files.   Lightroom provides a pretty good Export/Import tool for moving images from one PC to another and that's what I was doing this morning.

I exported all 2,383 images from the laptop Lightroom catalog to my portable pocket drive and when I plugged the pocket drive in the desktop computer I got the dreaded "click - click - click" sound from the pocket drive.   After 15 minutes the system gave up on that drive.  Good thing I wasn't depending on that copy.

Keeping multiple copies of images while traveling is always a good idea.  Here's my process:

Fuchsia Fireweed and Bee

1. I never delete images from a memory card until I am sure they are safe on the desktop PC and have at least one good nightly backup.   I have enough cards to cover a two week trip.
2. I don't have any cards bigger than 16 GB and most are 8 GB.   If a card gets corrupted then I don't lose too many images.
3. I have a copy of  Image Rescue 4 that came free with my Lexar cards.   I've had to use it more than once to read files off a corrupted memory card.
4. I download new images from the cards to the laptop at the end of each day. That gives me two copies.
5. I copy the RAW image files from the laptop to the external pocket drive (yep - same one that just died).  I don't do this every night but probably should.   This gives me three copies.
6. The external pocket drive goes in a separate bag from the computer and cameras.
7. When I get home I export all the images from Lightroom on the laptop and then import them into Lightroom on the desktop PC.   
8. I don't ease a memory card until I put it in the camera to reuse it.

No process is fool-proof but having some process that gives you multiple copies is critical.   I would hate to get back from a big vacation anticipating going through images from that great trip and find that I don't have them.

I hope you enjoy the Fuchsia Fireweed and Bee image.  It was the end of the season for Fireweed in Glacier but there were still a few blooms on the top of these tall plants. These were growing where the 2003 Roberts fire burned over 57,000 acres of the park.

Sunflowers

Nothing says summer like a big yellow Sunflower against a blue sky with white puffy clouds!   After a week of rain, the skies were clear on Saturday morning and it was time for a short trip to find something to shoot.   I had heard about a sunflower field in Piney Flats Tennessee, which sounded like fun.  All I knew was the name of the road.   Turns out that road is pretty long and we had no idea where along this long winding road the field was.  We drove from one end to the other and saw no sunflowers.   We turned around and headed back not knowing if it was even still there.   After a few miles we saw it!  It was in a curve and up from the road a bit which made it hard to see coming our first direction.

The owner happened to be out when we got there and with a wave of his hand let us know it was OK to take some photos.  The flowers weren't in the best shape this day.  Maybe it was the hot dry spell we had through all of June, or maybe it was the torrential downpours we had a few days earlier.   Either way it was going to take a little walking around to find the best angles to get the flowers with an interesting background, good light, and no distracting elements in the photo.   It was close to mid-day, which is typically a bad time for taking photos outdoors.  I needed to take a practice shot to check out the lighting.   I walked up to the first good specimen I saw, quickly focused and took the practice shot.  No tripod, no worrying about the f-stop or shutter speed.  Just a quick shot.

After that I wandered around the field with my camera on the tripod (I almost always shoot on a tripod) composing shots with attention to details in each photo.   After a while I had 80 or so shots (every shot yields three images at different exposures) and we headed home for lunch. 

While the photos were still loading, I decided to see what I could do with that first practice shot.   Little did I know it would turn out the be my favorite of the day.  I liked the lighting, the composition and the depth of field.   After a few tweaks on the computer I had this sunflower image.

I worked on the others but I didn't like any of them as much as this first one.

Seems like there were some lessons here:

• Don't make any assumptions about the quality and value of something (or someone) without taking a close look.  My assumptions may be completely wrong or keep me from seeing the real beauty.
• The beauty in a photo has less to do with my skills and equipment and more to do with God's creation.   Not only did he create the flower, but he provided the conditions that highlighted the beauty of that creation.
• The rules of photography, such as don't take photos outdoors at mid-day in bright sun, are not rules but guidelines.  I need to remember that.

I hope you enjoy this Summertime Sunflower.   I'm going to print it and have it available for purchase in the Star Trails Downtown Gallery in Kingsport around July 23rd.

Calm Before The Storm

Last week I got an email from a small hotel in Townsend Tennessee inviting us to come for the July 4th holiday.   Townsend, known as the quiet side of the Smokies, is a small one traffic light town just outside the entrance to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  Their fireworks were to be set off in the field next to the hotel.  That hotel didn't have any rooms left so we got a reservation at one of our other favorite hotels in Townsend - The Gateway Inn. 

Cosby Creek

You can click any of these photos for a larger version.  These and other recent photos are available online in my Recent Outing gallery.

With our reservation made we headed to the park on July 4th.  June and I tend to avoid Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge and the massive crowds as much as possible.  This day we came in from the East and stopped at the Cosby Campground for our big hike of the day.   We had plans to hike to the Mount Cammerer Watch Tower, which is 6 miles away and 2,400 feet up from the campground.   The hike up the Low Gap Trail to the Appalachian Trail was hot and tiring but worth it.  We were surprised to find a small creek and this foot bridge at the very beginning of the trail.  Time to take the boots off and wade into the creek for some shots! 

We found dense gardens of Rosebay Rhododendrons, Bee Balm, Turks Cap Lilies and other wildflowers along the trail.   When we reached the top we found the stone watch tower to be a great place with fantastic 360 degree views.  We stayed for a while and watched this storm move up the valley before heading back down the mountain.   We hiked and took photos for almost 7 hours and only saw 5 other people!  No crowds here except two very large wild turkeys near the trail. 

After a fantastic fireworks show on Wednesday night we got up and headed into Cades Cove just after sunrise.   We expected to find smaller crowds and wildlife in the cove that early.   The weather had been very hot and the wildlife was already back in the woods by the time we got there.   We were able to get out to the John Oliver cabin before the crowds and enjoyed watching the sun come up through the trees.   By this time the traffic was picking up and it was time to leave the cove and do some more hiking.

We picked a trail we had not hiked before and headed up the mountain.   After a mile or so we decided it was way too hot and muggy to keep hiking and there must be cooler spots so we turned around and headed for the Tremont Road and the Middle Prong River.   We found a shady spot in the river and got out on some large boulders, laid down and took a nap with our feet in the cool mountain water.   When we looked up we were treated to a beautiful canopy of green leaves and a blue cloudless sky.  It may have been the most peaceful place in the park at that time.   We had successfully avoided the crowds again!

The temps continued to rise into the mid-90's and we decided it was time for a late lunch and to head home.   Little did we know that by leaving early we avoided one of the worst storms to ever hit the park.   Thunderstorms brought 70 mile an hour winds and torrential rain, knocking down trees, blocking many of the park roads and killing two people.   It had been so peaceful a few hours before while we were napping on boulders in the river.  We had no idea of the destruction that was to come.

There may be some life lessons in our short two day trip to The Great Smoky Mountains. First, following the popular path may not lead to the best things in life.  Second, sometimes we have to go down a difficult path before we see the blessings.  Finally, storms are going to come through our lives, often when there are clear blue skies and we least expect them.  The narrow path may be difficult and there will be storms but God has promised his blessings for us.

The Smoky Mountains is one of our favorite places to visit and we will be back and we'll hike up to Mount Cammerer and enjoy the views again.   It's now one of my favorite hikes!

Appreciating My Backyard

This is what I see right now when standing in my backyard.   It looks a little different from the March 25 view I posted earlier.  The field is full of yellow buttercups.   Cattle graze here and I wondered why they didn't eat the buttercups.   I've learned that buttercups are poisonous and the acrid taste and the blistering of the mouth caused by their poison means the buttercups are left alone to grow and spread across the hills. 

I've been watching for dramatic skies at sunset but it does not happen very often and when it does it's usually gone by the time I can get out there.  I'll keep watching and trying to get out there in time.

This photo reminds me just how blessed I am.   Sometimes I focus too much on the material things and miss the blessings God has placed right in front of me.   This view is just one of those blessings.   My photography has made me appreciate God's gifts of beauty all around us.   June and I both notice that we are stopping and looking at things we would have passed right by without noticing a few years ago.   Canada Violets are pretty common around here in the spring.  They're not something that you would stop and take time to appreciate, especially in the rain.  But this one was taken last weekend in the Smokies in between rain storms.   If we hadn't taken the time to stop and been willing to risk the rain, we would have missed this wildflower decorated with jewels of rain.

What else has God placed before us?   The grand panoramas and the little jewels are all around us and say "Look what God has done here!".  A friend sent me an email this week with this verse that says it better than I can.

"God's invisible qualities and divine nature have been clearly seen in all creation, so that men are without excuse."  -  Romans 1:20

Let's slow down and appreciate God's invisible qualities and divine nature all around us.

Springtime In The Smokies

Every season is special in the Great Smokey Mountains National Park.  Fall brings a blaze of color as the leaves change before falling to the ground.  New fallen snow in the Winter makes everything quiet and pure.  With all the different elevations in the mountains you can find wild flowers blooming in the summer and later in the summer you can find Elk and other wildlife out in force.

My favorite season is still Spring and Spring in the park brings an explosion of new growth.  The green of new growth on the trees is brilliant, the moss on the rocks and downed trees is almost electric, and wildflowers are everywhere you look.  Over 1,660 kinds of flowering plants can be found in the park, more than in any other North American national park!   Right now the park is changing almost daily as new varieties bloom and others fade away for another year.   Spring also brings rains that fill the creeks and waterfalls throughout the park.  

Last weekend June and I spent Friday afternoon, Saturday and part of Sunday hiking and enjoying the beauty of God's creation busting out everywhere we looked.  We went to some new areas of the park we had not visited before and a waterfall we had never seen because it's always  been too crowded (Laurel Falls - a little rain can drive people away).  As with most all our vacations, we got up at 4:30 AM Saturday morning to drive to one of the best spots for sunrise in the park.   When we got close the fog rolled in and we were creeping along at about 5 mph.  The fog cleared but the clouds blocked the sunrise.   The cars passing along the Newfound Gap Road allowed me to create some interesting long exposure photos.   I call this one "Close Encounters of the Smoky Mountain Kind".   If you are old enough to remember Close Encounters of the Third Kind you may remember the scene where the spaceships were flying through the mountains just above the road with nothing but their lights showing.  This reminds me of that scene.

If white is the color of winter, yellow/orange the color of fall, then green is the color of spring in the mountains.   The new growth on the brush and trees is that bright green that says Spring!  But it's not just leaves and grass that are green this time of year.  The moss on downed trees and rocks in the streams is beautiful.  It's a soft green blanket that covers the forest floor, banks of creeks, and rocks sticking up out of the creeks and rivers.   There are times that it looks like the moss is electric it's so bright. 

Because of the mild winter and the warmer that usual spring the wildflowers are blooming 2 - 3 weeks early this year.  Normally the third week of April is the peak wildflower time but this year we found an abundance of flowers blooming in the lower elevations of the park.   We saw multiple varieties of Trillium, Jack-in-the-Pulpit, Phlox, Wild Geraniums, Wild Columbine, Bishops Caps, Fringed Phacelia , Bluets, Shooting Stars, Violets, Showy Orchis and even one Lady Slipper Orchid that had bloomed very early. 

My favorite wildflower spot of this trip was actually right on the Newfound Gap Road at a pull off.  We we heading back towards Townsend and it had started to rain.   We saw some Yellow Trillium on the side of the road and decided to pull off and check it out.  What a find!   There were beautiful large Yellow Trillium surrounded by Fringed Phacelia and Bishops Caps on a hillside.  It was raining enough that water was pooling in the large leaves of the Trillium and the overcast skies made the colors more intense.


We hope to get back to the park again before the end of the too short Spring wildflower season.  We'll hit some more places and hopefully see different varieties.


These three photos, plus 23 others are available in the Recent Outing Gallery on my website.  Check them out and let me know what you think.

Happy Valentines Day

I'm a little late getting this out. 

This Trillium was taken last spring on a hiking trail near Looking Glass Falls, which is near Brevard NC.   I "enhanced" the photo a bit by blurring and darkening the edges to draw attention to the flower.  I also cloned out some distracting bright spots where the light was shining through from behind (it was a bright sunny day).    I used a combination of Adobe Lightroom, Adobe Photoshop Elements (cloning), and Nik Color Efex Pro (bluring the edges).

Flower Macros

Spring Time!  The flowers are blooming all around, in the garden, wildflowers in the park, and even weeds in the lawn!   This is a great time to enjoy God's creations.  Look closely at a flower or leaf.  Now look closer.  It's amazing what you can discover in the delicate details in these little plants.   

I enjoy getting out and taking close up or "macro" photos of flowers in the spring.  So far I've taken pictures of tulips, crocuses and mountain laurel growing in the yard.  On Good Friday I went to Laurel Run Park near Church Hill Tennessee and got pictures of wildflowers that had just opened.  This was a scouting run for a Camera Club outing on April 10.  Unless we have a freeze between now and then the wildflowers will be even more beautiful a week from now.

The photo on the right is a tulip leaf.  For years I've ignored the leaves waiting on the flowers.  Now that I've looked closer I see the beauty in all parts of the flower.   I call this one "A Cup of Light"  because it looks like the light is about to spill over the top of the leaf.

I've started a Macro Flower album on my website and will be adding pictures to it all spring.  You can go to it directly via this link -  Macro Flowers Album   Be sure to keep checking back every so often as I add more photos of the flowers of springtime.

The yellow and purple photo on the left is a purple crocus.   When you're taking photos that close up, the range of focus or depth of field is extremely small.   In this case only about 1/8" is in focus. 

The orange and while photo on the right is a white crocus.  

Finally, this is a red tulip petal.  It was taken in the morning when the sun was low and shining across the petal and through the water drops.

There are more photos in the Macro Flower album and I'll be adding more over the next several weeks.  I hope you enjoy these.

Getting Out Of Your Comfort Zone

It snowed about half a foot here in Kingsport last night.  I got out and took a few pictures, but nothing much worth sharing.   It was cloudy and snowy all day so I couldn't take any examples of front and side lighting, so that post will have to wait.

I did get the macro lens out and tried taking some very non-landscape shots.  Taking pictures of things other than mountains, lakes, waterfalls, and wildlife is a little outside my photographic comfort zone.  I'm sure many photographers are like me, we have our favorite subjects and don't try shooting different subjects often enough.  Participating in a monthly photography challenge, a scavenger hunt, or other activity that makes us branch out is a great way to learn new things and develop some new styles of photography. 

The Eastman Camera Club is running a monthly challenge and the theme for February is "Sweet Tooth".  I had to come up with something to show for this month's challenge so I looked around home to see what I could come up with.  We had four Hersey Kisses left.   Add a mirror, some Rain-X and some water drops, and you come out with something like this.

You can click on any of these thumbnails for a larger view.

I used Rain-X on the mirror to make the water bead up.  The biggest challenge was finding a place to shoot where I didn't get distracting things in the background.  It was surprisingly difficult with the mirror.  I eventually had to take some pictures off the wall.

With the "Sweet Tooth" challenge out of the way, I decided to try something else I had seen done before.  I got a piece of glass from an old picture frame and put Rain-X on it.  I then laid it between two chairs and put some artificial flowers on the floor below it.  I carefully put drops of water on the glass like I had done with the mirror.  I then set up my tripod so I could shoot straight down through the water drops to the flowers below.  The trick is to focus on the water drops and let the flowers go out of focus.  By focusing on the water drops you can see the flowers in focus like they are inside the drops!    I held a LED flashlight below the glass and shined it on the flowers.  Putting the flashlight below the glass eliminates glare.  This is another very cool effect!

I was using a 100mm macro lens and shooting from about 10 inches above the drops.  When I moved closer to the drops the depth of field became so small that it was almost impossible to keep the entire drop in focus. 

If it wasn't for the monthly challenge I would probably not taken these photos.   I encourage you to participate in one of the challenges, or anything that forces you out of your photographic comfort zone.