~ Joy of Photography
One enjoyment of having a garden is the wonderful creatures that come around.
I have migrating Monarch and Painted Lady butterflies every Autumn, Red Admiral butterflies in the Spring, and occasionally I see giant moths like this Polyphemus.
Feature Image Story
Continue reading “How to Capture Beautiful Butterfly and Moth Photos in Your Garden”
‘Waterlily’ Colchicums are one of my favorite flowers. Deer generally don’t touch them. They spring up like magic in the fall
I used a Canon 100MM Macro F 2.8 Lens for all of these images.
The ‘Waterlily’ Colchicum is a hybrid resulting from a cross of Colchicum autumnale ‘Alboplenum’ and Colchicum speciosum ‘Album’. The flowers resemble a water lily, hence the name. The fully double, lilac-pink flowers bloom in late summer to early fall on naked stems to 6″ tall.
Up to two-foot tall Leaves appear in the Spring and die back in the summer. The flowers appear out of nowhere, with no leaves in early Autumn. I plant them in beds with low growing groundcovers to add a touch of green leaves.
Following are more colchicum images.
Continue reading “Discover the ‘Waterlily’ Colchicum: A Fall Flowering Marvel”
We have three crabapple trees in the front that have red berries and one in the back with yellow berries. This is the one will yellow berries. It looks like floating eyeballs.
I shot it from below, looking almost straight up.
I used a Canon 24-105MM F4 L Lens at 47mm, ISO 200 for 1/60 second at F18.
Following are images of the front yard.
Continue reading “Exploring Crabapple Trees, One Looks Like Yellow Eyeballs”
Feature Image Details
That is what our backyard looks like at the peak of Autumn. The maples turn late. It was early November.
I used a Canon 24-105MM F4 L Lens at 35mm for 20 seconds at F16.
I used fill flash to light the trees. The flash, the ambient light, and the light inside the house were all similar. Continue reading “How to Grow and Photograph Colorful Japanese Maples”
Frost forms on clear, cold, windless nights. It does not last long once the sun hit any foliage.
Feature Image Details
I used a my Canon 100MM Macro F 2.8 Lens at perhaps 1/4 life size.
This is a scanned image from a shot I took years ago on film.
The 100MM macro lens is excellent lens for butterflies, small insects, and flowers. Continue reading “Capturing Nature: Macro Photography of Frost with a Canon 100MM Lens”
Purple prairie coneflowers are very hardy and mostly deer resistant. They put on a long show in July in my garden every year.
Feature Image Details
For this set of images I used a my Canon 100MM Macro F 2.8 Lens at F16.
This is a fixed focal length macro lens. It’s an excellent lens for butterflies and small insects.
Focus Stacking
All of these images are focus-stacked.
I took 12 shots in the composite above. Instead of blending manually, I used Helicon Focus to blend them.
For comparison purposes, here is one of the frames, un-stacked.
Single Image – Not Focus Stacked
The above image was one of the many used in the preceding focus-stacked image. I blurred the background a bit in the final focus-stacked image to make the seed head stand out.
Depth of Field
Depth of field on close-up images is extremely shallow. The only way to get a completely sharp image is to focus stack.
Helicon Focus works best with stationary objects. Mountains don’t move but flowers do.
I took this set of images on a very calm day with little wind.
See image number 2 below of the Green Tree Frog for another example of focus stacking.
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Columbines are one of my favorite flowers. Unfortunately, the new hybrids tend to revert colors or die out over time.
Columbine Tips
Columbines grow best in filtered sunlight. I grow them in the light shade of towering white oak and bur oak threes that have a nice open canopy.
Columbines and White Oak Tree
Columbines and Japanese Forest Grass
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The feature image is a huge Henry Kelsey rose, stand-alone.
Henry Kelsey is exceptionally hardy and grows in Canada. It is a once-a-summer bloomer but the bloom is spectacular, even in the shade of a huge White Oak Tree.
Feature Image Details
Canon 24-105MM F4 L Lens at 55mm 1/15th of a second, F14 at ISO 250
Jackmanii Clematis
Nelly Moser Clematis and Zephirine Dauphin Rose
Roses and Clematis are a classic combination.
Zephirine Dauphin is not hardy in our area. It is at best a Zone 6 rose and we are on the hard side of 5.
It survived many years because I wrapped it in burlap over the winter and it was in a relatively sheltered spot.
Bad News
I lost Zephirine, huge pieces of Henry, four once beautiful Japanese Maples, and at least one beautiful Paperbark Maple (another is still questionable), this past Winter.
What Happened?
Winter was not all that harsh, but there were two brutal cold snaps in April that killed all the buds.
Henry survived and will recover. He put on a good show this year but about 1/3 size.
Dear Zephirine is gone forever along with the Japanese Maples and one Paperbark Maple.
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Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Those with a deer problem may wish to consider deer-resistant plants. At the top of the list are Alliums, Daffodils, Bleeding Hearts, ferns, and Iris.
Feature Image Details
Canon 24-105MM F4 L Lens for 1/6th of a second, F20 at ISO 125
Those are Siberian Iris in the foreground and purple-on-purple Bearded Iris further back. The round globes are Globemaster alliums.
Alliums are in the garlic family. Deer will not touch them.
Alliums and Iris will come back every year provided conditions are not too wet. Neither likes soggy soil and are prone to root rot in such conditions.
Bearded Iris and Globemasters
Purple Sensation Alliums
Purple Sensation Alliums
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Every year I make “perching baskets”. They are essentially hanging baskets except they are heavy and sit on 4×4 posts instead of hanging.
I make my own baskets rather than buying them. These baskets are in the shade. Anthuriums, bromeliads, or even geraniums make a good centerpiece. The latter do well in the sun too.
When I was weeding my garden a week or so ago a small tree frog hopped on my shirt. I picked it up and placed it on one of my bromeliads and it sat there for a number of images.
Feature Image Details
Canon 100MM Macro F 2.8 Lens for 1/60 of a second F8 at ISO 1000.
I took 8 images, first focusing on the eyes as they are the most critical element, then the right and left feet, the nose and various other spots including the back of the frog.
This is very necessary. I was right on top of that frog, inches away and depth of field is razor thin.
Because of the leg extension, it looks much bigger than it is. There is very little cropping here, just a bit to center the frog perfectly. The frog, not counting the extension of the legs, is somewhere between the size of a quarter and a half-dollar.
I was very lucky this little guy or gal did not move much for a sequence of images. I blended the images keeping the sharp portions of each one.
Perching Baskets
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Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Bleeding Hearts and Golden Ducat Daffodils
Normally I like everything sharp, but in these images I used open apertures to throw the backgrounds out of focus.
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The images were taken in early February after a winter snowfall. The next set of images were taken on a different day. Light constantly changes.
On the following set of images, the sun was higher in the sky then went behind a weak cloud at sunset so the colors are not as intense.
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Mike “Mish” Shedlock