Exploring the wonders of creation through a 50mm lens...and other lenses too.

One of my favorite books that my wife and I used to read to our boys when they were younger is Moo Moo Brown Cow, Have You Any Milk, the story of a kid who lives on a farm and gets a great deal of help from his animal friends before heading to bed. It’s a charming little tale, perfect for sending children off to sleep, and includes a few lines that, for whatever reason, have stuck with me over the years. Lines including:

Then we’ll dream the whole night through. Of flowers to sip, green grass to chew, a golden grain of wheat or two. The moon so high and sky so blue…

I don’t really know why, but something about the gentle rolling cadence of the lines in this book has always stuck with me, and I have always held it in quite high regard. The phrase “A golden grain of wheat or two” was on my mind when I took this photo, though to be honest I am not entirely certain that the grain in question actually is wheat. For an Oklahoman, formerly Minnesota, and before that, a Nebraskan, I know remarkably little about agriculture. Nevertheless, I do know a thing or two about what makes a compelling photograph :)

I have taken a few shots like this one over the years, and the challenge, I have learned, is to figure out how to compose the image so as to emphasize the subject. Lighting is key, of course, but how to make the subject stand out against the background is another matter entirely. For this image the answer presented itself in relatively quick fashion: use the bright colors of the surrounding garden to isolate the subject and, in the process, create a rich vibrant color palette that goes well beyond simple earth tones.

I took this image on a rainy day, our first in several weeks, in late October on the Oklahoma State University campus–the formal gardens, to be precise, just west of the Student Union. Our campus botanists and arborists had done up the place in elegant fashion as a way of welcoming the tens of thousands of visitors that would soon be descending on Stillwater for America’s Greatest Homecoming. In a brief reprieve from the light precipitation, I got out my Nikon D750 and 105mm f/2.8 macro lens to take advantage of the soaking flowers and overcast sky, which is one of my favorite lighting conditions to shoot in. Especially when it comes to photos of flowers and the like.

I shot this at f/9.5 to get a relatively shallow, but not too shallow, depth of field. I wanted the subject to be sharp while the background a beautiful blur, and that’s exactly what I was able to achieve. I did spend a few minutes angling myself such that the background colors were utilized to maximum effect and, on the whole, I think it worked save for the yellows in the top-right detracting just a bit too much from the wheat. (Or whatever it is.) I barely edited the image too, with just a slight crop on the top-right and a few basic color/exposure adjustments. In short, what you’re seeing here isn’t necessarily photographic brilliance but nature’s paintbrush, a scene created by God but captured, in a bit of mid-afternoon serendipity, by me. And it sure was fun.

I always like taking pictures like this, with a butterfly more or less centered in the frame while interacting in some manner with a flower or plant. It’s not a complicated composition and there’s nothing about these kinds of images that’s going to win awards for creativity or break new ground from an artistic point of view, but they are phenomenally fun to take. Butterflies are a bit more compliant than other flying bugs and animals, in that they move a bit slower and tend to stay in one place a bit longer than, say, honeybees or hummingbirds. Their bright colors almost make it difficult to not get good shots, and you can often find them in groups–that is, if one is around chances are others will be too. And when everything aligns and you find yourself in the right place, at the right time, with your camera at the ready, and able to capture a moment like this…*chef’s kiss*

I highly recommend you try it :)

There is one thing I have changed in my approach to butterfly photos over the years, and you can see it exemplified here. I now make an effort to intentionally position myself so that the butterflies are backlit, which makes their already-colorful wings positively explode with an electric energy that you just don’t get with traditional front-lighting. This strategy helped in a couple of ways here, by not only making the butterfly appear a bright translucent green but also causing the purple flower to take on a shiny purple glow with bright accents around its edges. This technique almost always results in images that far surpass their frontlit counterparts, and it’s an extraordinarily fun practice to try out. You can clear see the effect here with the butterflies wings all aglow, outlined with a white shine and its legs deftly gripping the purple flower bud. Much of that would be lost if this were taken with the sun on the other side, but as it stands the lighting alone transforms this rather pedestrian photo into something pretty special.

The interesting thing about this shot, that doesn’t often happen in the photos I take, is that the subject–the animal–is not actually the focal point of the image. Rather, your eye is drawn first and foremost to the flower and the butterfly, whose colors blend in quite thoroughly with the surrounding colors, is almost an afterthought. One could almost say it’s camouflaged and hidden in plain sight, and only upon closer inspection does the viewer notice that something more is in the shot beyond the purple flower. It’s an unexpected way of composing the shot that I didn’t actually plan but, on reflection, I quite like.

When I was a kid the only way to listen to new music for free was by tuning into a local radio station, like 102.7 KFRX or 106.3 The Blaze. It was a simpler time, and one I look back on with a great deal of fondness, though I suppose it’s probably on par with the rose-colored lenses through which most adults view their childhoods. (If I were to be shot back in time, Marty McFly-style, I would probably miss out on a lot of the modern conveniences we have today. But that’s not really how nostalgia works, is it?) Every few songs there would be a series of commercials, and for a good stretch of time one of those commercials was for something called a Hearts on Fire diamond from a local outfit called Sartor Hamann Jewelers. I don’t remember any specifics about the ad, or the diamond, or anything really other than the somewhat lispy host, possibly the owner or the founder of the business, who would go on about how sure you could go somewhere else to get your loved on a boring normal everyday diamond, but only Sartor Hamann had the Hearts on Fire diamond which was extra finely-cut, or ultra-rare, or exquisitely-set, or…something. Who knows. Not me, that’s for sure. But the commercial, and the odd-sounding name (Why would someone want to set someone’s heart ablaze?) stuck with me over the years, which I suppose is probably the mark of a good advertising campaign. Well done, Mr. Hamann. You win this round.

When I was at the OSU Botanic Garden recently with my family and some friends I came across this crystal heart, hanging by a rusty chain, not far from where a pair of kodama were keeping watch over the grounds. Though the heart was made of plastic and certainly not on fire, it brought me back to my high school days in the blink of an eye and all I could think about was that incessant radio ad. It’s interesting how things happen like that–one minute you are going about your business, but then you smell something, hear a noise, see a picture, or stumble across an object and you are instantly transported elsewhere with all manner of memories flooding back if even for just a fleeting moment.

I don’t want to read too much into this–it’s a plastic heart hanging from a tree, after all–but it was a fun little trip down memory lane and I’m glad I could capture the moment with my camera. I shot this at f/8 and was quite pleased with how everything turned out: the blurry background, the sharp vertices, and the colors of the garden flowers reflecting off the facets. And though this was a neat little photo to take I did not tarry long, as I wanted to put the camera down and get back to my wife, our kids, and our friends who were busy making memories of their own. And I wanted to be a part of them.

I’m not sure what my first Hayao Miyazaki movie was, but it just might have been Spirited Away, which I had the pleasure of watching in a movie theater near downtown Lincoln, Nebraska, back in college. Perhaps it was Princess Mononoke, which I rented (probably without paying) from the video department (which I managed) tucked away in the corner of the Russ’s Market I worked in to pay for rent, gas, and school. It undoubtedly was not Kiki’s Delivery Service, which I saw with my friend Gavin–probably in his house on 17th street either before or after playing a game of spades with Drew and Robert, but if not then certainly in our rental house on 51st Street where Gavin and I lived, along with Evan, Nick, Ross, Ben, Simon (the other one), Craig, and other friends who rotated in and out of for four years while we were all at UNL. My first Miyazaki film was definitely not My Neighbor Totoro, which I watched on the recommendation of Jennica, one of my students, when I taught high school in Andover, MN, on the north side of the Twin Cities. Nor was it Howl’s Moving Castle which I have seen but do not remember when, where, or really anything about the movie at all come to think of it.

But here’s the thing about Miyazaki movies: they leave an impression. They transport you to another place and time, and invite you to sit back and absorb the sheer wonder of the world you are invited to inhabit, if only for a little while, along with all its vibrant and unique characters. Creatures great and small, filled with heart and emotion, each with a story to tell or, as Michael W. Smith might say, a place in this world. (Note: please leave that link un-clicked. The song, and its accompanying video, are impossibly cheesy. But decades later that sandpaper-scratchy voice is still wandering around in my head, loath to vacate the space between my ears though long have I tried.)

Creatures such as the kodama you see here, whose presence is a clear and tangible indicator that the forest they inhabit is doing OK.

I saw these while wandering through the OSU Botanic Gardens with my family and some of our friends on a warm September afternoon, and was delighted to have my Nikon D750 and 105mm f/2.8 macro lens along for the occasion. Each of these little white figures is about an inch tall, and someone had placed them in a shallow pan hanging by three chains from the branch of a tree near the garden entrance. It was one of those little moments of serendipity that you encounter every so often that reminds you how clever and creative people can be–that someone thought to put these little creatures in the middle of the garden to keep watch, in a manner of speaking, over the area and reassure visitors that everything is going to be alright.

I experimented with a few different angles and focal lengths, as I almost always do when shooting close-ups like this, but didn’t want to move the figures at all—only myself and my camera. I tried a few shots with the shorter one in focus but found that I preferred this one, and with the light hitting it as you see here it really made for a fun composition. When both figured were well-lit it didn’t have quite the same effect, but here your eye is brought squarely to the first one and then to everything else in the frame which slowly reveals itself the more you look at the image.

This was a fun picture to take, a creative scene to stumble upon, and a reminder that I really need to show my kids some Miyazaki movies :)

One of my favorite lighting techniques, at least for artistic or experimental shots, is to light my subjects from behind. It’s not something that’s altogether intuitive for me, as it goes against much of what I learned when I first started getting into photography years ago, but I have tried to pay attention to how a little (or a lot) of backlighting can elevate and transform a photo and lift the mundane into something extraordinary. Case in point: this coleus plant, which I came across while wandering around the OSU Botanic Gardens with my family and some friends on a Saturday afternoon in early September. There are dozens of these brightly-colored plants all around the gardens and while they certainly are cool to look at, they somewhat ironically do not always make great photo subjects. (Or perhaps I’m just not looking closely, or thinking creatively, enough. A challenge, perhaps? Hmm…) That was not the case here.

This particular coleus was practically aflame in the afternoon sun, with the light bounding off the edges of these leaves to create a silhouette that gives the entire composition a feeling of life and energy–almost like a flame twisting and writing as it makes its way upwards. I had my D750 and 105mm f/2.8 macro lens, which is an outstanding combination for an afternoon among nature, and once I had this shot in mind the next thing to consider was the aperture: Too small and the depth of field would be too wide. Too large and the edges of the leaf would not be in focus. I also had to consider the angle from which I was shooting, and the background behind the plant as well. Finally, I didn’t want to spend too long taking this shot because I also wanted to hang out with family and friends :)

I took this at f/19 which, while a bit smaller than I would have preferred, did help me meet my primary goals for the shot. I think a smaller aperture would have been possible with a bit more patience and experimentation, but again, time was of the essence. I do like how the border in the foreground of the leaf is (mostly) sharp and in focus while the back of the leaf is blurry, which shows just how crazy the DOF tolerances are when shooting close up. And this wasn’t even that close! This leaf, or rather collection of leaves, measures about five inches from left to right–certainly too big to be considered a macro shot, but a great example of how versatile a macro lens can be nonetheless.

In some ways this shot is an upgraded version of the sunrise image from last week, and even though the scale of the photos is entirely different the basic principles are kind of the same: lighting a subject from behind in order to get a glowing silhouette. It goes to show, or at least shows me anyway, that at the end of the day photography is often about the same basic principles that it always has been. It’s light and physics, and everything else is just details :)