Sunday, August 4, 2013

More from the water gardens

I returned to editing yesterday's batch of photos from Water and Garden Creations, and realized that in my eagerness to post the punchy, eye-catching shots I had skipped some of the elegant, slightly understated, simple flower compositions. These were some of my first shots of the morning, when the light was particularly soft.



Even while concentrating on flowers, I can't resist the urge to capture an insect in the scene, even a common house fly. Maybe it's the influence of the classical painting tradition of including an unsought visitor in an otherwise pristine still life of fruit and game.





I suppose this next one would qualify as "punchy" - there was so much contrast that it was easy to allow the background to go black when I exposed for my subject. I will always think of these as "shower head plants", I'm afraid.


And a return to tranquility...



Another addition - a pair of accidental catches. As I shot the bee moving around the flower, a blue dragonfly came in for a fly-by. I wish I could have caught it fully in the frame, but it rose to avoid the traffic and didn't appear at all in subsequent shots. It's still a fun sequence to me, so have a look:




As always, if you see anything that you would like to have in print, please drop me a line:


Permalink: http://jilcp.blogspot.com/2013/08/more-from-water-gardens.html

6 comments:

  1. Lovely shots, Jess. As I must be easily amused, I admit my favorite of this bunch is that silly looking shower head plant. Something about it is very "ET", and humorous to me.

    Ken

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    1. A low flow shower head that comes with 16 blueberries? ;)

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    2. Shower and breakfast at the same time? Could be a time-saver if you're running late to the office.

      Fabulous pictures as always, Jess. Thanks for sharing them with us.

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    3. Ha! Now you've got me imagining picking blueberries and washing them, all in one direct motion to the mouth. The organic fruit shower, patent pending.

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  2. I haven't visited your website for awhile, and it was wonderful to see all the exciting photos that you've done in that time!One beauty after another!
    I couldn't help noticing, in your comments, a reference to the habit of the Dutch Masters, who always included insects in their still lifes.
    EVAnonymous

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    1. I figure that no matter how humble my efforts, any little bits that I can learn by imitating great painters can be good for me. Even incidental stylistic things that may have no intrinsic value are still part of learning by imitation.

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