SECOND APPEARANCE

Hard to believe this was almost a week ago. A few days earlier our crocus and snow bells showed their first blossoms until they got all covered again during a snow storm last Monday. So, here is a couple photos from the second appearance of spring flowers in our yard this year.

It’s not really macro photography but the old SIGMA 150/f2.8 macro lens is still in my bag and finds employment for shots like this. Most modern lenses focus much faster, but if the camera is locked on the subject, this lens delivers still tack sharp results. Another reason for me to use this lens sometimes is the Minimum Focusing Distance (MFD), which is 15 inches (0.38m). A ‘killer tool’ for any detail shots!

ANOTHER SIGN OF SPRING

If there is anything I don’t like about March here in eastern Iowa, it’s the fact that we have so many gray days without any sun. Today was another one of those. The photo of the crocuses is from yesterday, when a little more light was available and no extra efforts were necessary to make the colors pop. For this picture I employed the Nikkor 16-35, f/4 and closed down to f/10 for more depth of field than in the photo of the Hepatica from yesterday’s blog post. As I always stress, I’m not a flower photographer, but with all the gray and brown from last winter on the ground a few colors don’t hurt and keep the spirit up on a day like this.

SUGAR MAPLE FLOWERS

As predicted, the snow from last Saturday melted away yesterday very rapidly. Despite some frost during the night, it looks like all plants, shrubs, and trees survived the drop in temperature without much damage. The flowers of our Maple Tree in front of the house looked beautiful this evening and when the setting sun created some magic light, I had to get the camera out and capture it. Over the years I took many photos of maple leaves in gorgeous light during autumn, but I don’t think I ever told a story about this maple tree in spring.

So what were the choices in order to make this click? I could have had every maple flower in focus, or at least nearly sharp, by closing the aperture down and have more depth of focus. The price to pay would have been the increase to a very high ISO value and as a result the introduction of a lot of noise in the picture. Instead I chose to shoot wide open (f/4 @ 1/640 s, ISO 400, and 200 mm focal length). Only a few maple flowers are sharp but capturing the mood of this scene and separating the subject from the background was in my humble opinion the better choice.

SPRING PICTURES??

I was traveling the whole week and came back full of hope for a nice and warm weekend. Right now all the leaves come out and end of April is usually the arrival time for many migrating birds here in our woods. But it came totally different today. It rained and snowed all day long and as I’m writing this we still have some snow cover.

Chipping Sparrow

But there is always a story to tell in weather like this and that’s what I tried to do when I went out with the camera in hand. The combination of fresh green and flowers with the wet snow made for a good target. Three Chipping Sparrows were the only birds beside our American Robins that were present this evening. The male House Wrens arrived this week but except for the early morning they kept hidden during the day.

Tomorrow it is supposed to be warmer again and I’m sure the layer of snow on the ground will be history soon.

IT'S NOT ABOUT FLOWERS...

Nikon D300s, Sigma 150mm / f2.8 APO EX DG HSM                                   

No, this post is not about flowers. It is about light. Flowers can be very pretty but most pictures of garden flowers are boring. It is a little bit like taking the picture of someone else’s artwork. It may not be the photo that becomes art in both cases. Sure, using flowers as a subject for honing your photography skills on the technical level is a valid way to do. They are perfect for learning about depth of field, exposure, exposure compensation, and other things. Sheer beauty might be a reason for taking a picture but I have seen too many technical perfect photos of flowers that totally miss the story telling. So, what’s my solution for this? I don’t really have a universal one, but making the click at the right time of the day helps to tell the story about the season and this shaft of light just before sunset, that only occurs if there are no leaves at the trees in our neck of the woods…