Macro Details

I've always been facinated by macro photography.  Looking at every day objects up close gives me a whole new perspective on the things I see every day.  Flowers are a great example.  We see them every day but rarely stop to appreciated how intricate they are.

This first example is little groups of flowers found along my mom's driveway.  I have no idea what they are but from a distance they look like boring little pink flowers.  Get up close and it is a whole different story.  Changing my perspective (lying down on my stomach) and utilizing my 105mm macro lens revealed these delicate curled stamen.  To really appreciate these structures go to my site and view the image at original size (O in the size choices).

This image was a little difficult to capture as I was unable to use my tripod.  Instead I had to use the same breathing techniques I do when at the rifle range.  To complicate things a little further there was the slightest breeze which really moves around these miniature flowers.  Thankfully my mom is very supportive of these little endeavors and used one of my pop-up reflectors to create a wind break.  After a few attempts I got one that I liked.  The only post processing done on this shot was a white balance adjustment and minor sharpening.

Here is another flower that looked very unassuming from my 6'3" vantage point.  Originally I was drawn to this flower because of the vibrant color and the darker veins that ran from the center out.  After my first shot I saw the sharp, crown-like structure in the center.  Not sure if this is stamen or not but since it is interesting I don't really care.   This was another shot that was hard to get because of the movement of the flower.  Post on this consisted of minor sharpening and removal of a few dust spots.

The last one is one of my favorite flowers that can be found at my mom's house.  They are pretty large flowers so I wanted to focus on one element instead of the flower as a whole.  In an ideal world the stamen in this flower would all be in a nice row so they are all in focus but nature doesn't like doing that.  I didn't want to increase the depth of field since that would draw attention away from my primary subject.  When out of focus the flower provides a wonderful background as it transitions from deep red to vibrant yellow.  Post on this image was a white balance adjustment and minor sharpening.

Be sure to check them out at their original sizes at my site.  As always they are available for purchase in a wide variety of forms.