Sometimes in all the wonder and beauty of a flower we forget that it’s a highly engineered pollen spreading machine, and the things that make it beautiful and attractive to us are designed to attract insects to further it’s species.

Doesn’t make it any less beautiful to me though… I think it makes it more interesting!

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Sometimes, the light just presents itself to you as a photographer, and begs and screams to you to “TAKE THE PICTURE!”

This was one of those moments.

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I think this is my favorite water lily photo I’ve ever taken. It actually might be my favorite flower photo I’ve ever taken.

Yesterday I ran over to the Birmingham Botanical Gardens after work, and to my pleasant surprise met ~Amabile~, whose work I’ve always admired and really loved. She ran out of card space and I ran out of battery, but it was really neat to watch her work.

As many of you know, flickr is one of three or so ways I attempt to improve my photography. I look at other images, and ask myself: “why does this stand out to me?” It occurred to me yesterday that in order to internalize what I’m learning, and replicate it in my work, I in some way have to be able to describe it. I have to be able to quantify a graphic art in words.

The way to be able to do that is to have vocabulary to describe photography. Words like crop factor, leading lines, hard light, soft light, harsh, gentle, saturated, monochrome… and many more like it. Sometimes, I sit there at an image I like and just come up with “tags” almost that describe the image. It sounds really stupid, but it really does help. As recently I’m obsessed with light, most of the time these days I’m drawn to very dramatic lighting, and I try to identify the light source, why it’s so graphically powerful, and how I can replicate it in my work. Don’t get me wrong… I’m not copying other people’s art, but I am trying my hardest to learn from it.

You also have to move beyond the concrete nature of technique and identify message, emotion. How does this shot make you feel? Are you sad, nostalgic, joyous, morose, or angry? And almost more importantly, using that vocabulary, what aspects of this photo capture that feeling?

Anyway, just some thoughts, not really sorted out like they should be.

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My brother Graham and I are best of friends. Which is good, because we are pretty much polar opposites. He always exudes confidence, determination. Myself, not so much.

Strobist:
I took this quick snap while he was playing his beloved cello, with one SB-900 on the left with a Softbox III on it (you know I love that thing, don’t you?) and I think a SB-800 hand held for a catchlight. We had just finished swimming in a lake, hence his rather shiny appearance.

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This is what happens when it’s 1100 and I don’t have a photo for tomorrow, and I’m in a room with nothing interesting and no one else with a couple flashes and tripods.

As always, the disclaimer. I *hate* self-portraits as a rule. I hate doing them, and I hate 90% of other people’s selfies. Selfies always seem so… selfish. But I keep doing them because it’s one way to learn. I have no interest in people seeing me on the internet, having pictures of myself, but I do have an interest in understanding how light works and where I can place them for best results. Now that that’s out of the way, photo info:

Strobist: One SB-900 above me, about 3 inches from my face, above me. (It’s actually in frame, I cloned it out.)

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My brother just bought a cello on craigslist. He loves it to death, and can’t stop playing it. I’m so glad that he was able to find one that nice. It makes for good pictures too!

Strobist: One SB-900 with a lumiquest softbox III on the camera left, and a sb-600 bouncing off the wall and ceiling on the right.

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Although I am working on using external flashes, I still love natural light. Now, I try to evaluate what it is about big windows and low sun that makes the things I see just amazing. I’ll often stop and stare at something lit beautifully so long that my family will walk off shaking their heads.

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I’ve always wanted to do this shot… unfortunately my camera seemingly doesn’t. Does anyone know if these strange markings on the original photo are normal? They start showing up in dark places after around 30 seconds, and get stronger as the exposure continues. I had a cap over the viewfinder, and I’ve shot it complete darkness, so it’s not ambient light. Any thoughts?

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I took a lot of photos of this sunset, but this one is probably my favorite. I think the rather uncommon vertical orientation gives a feel of height and depth, much like a real sunset.

HDR, when used properly can give the real color and light that your eye sees. This is more like what it was like to be there. It was amazing.

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This is our latest addition to our multitude of felines. The guys named him Junior Barnes after the character from Bill Cosby’s stand up routine. He’s very small, he hasn’t mastered running yet. It’s funny, he’ll set off, but his back end is faster than his front end, and when his tail starts to catch up with his head he looks backward to see what is going on, and tumbles and falls. Doesn’t stop him though.

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