Crazy, huh? Spring is so…springy. The two Ws are just irresistible – wildflowers and waterfalls. I’ve shot these particular falls before, but after a big storm knocked branches and whole trees down so the cascades were a mess. When I saw fellow photographer Jeff Newcomer’s recent post about Garwin falls, I saw they were clear and that I’d have to copy his composition. I didn’t copy his processing though; sepia is something I don’t often do, but this time it seemed a great choice. There was color in the shot, but not like the side view and so I processed it differently. Ditto with the long view. I wanted to see if I could warm it up some and still make it believable. If I were presenting these as a set, I’d process them all the same, but since I’m not I didn’t. These are my rules, I make ’em up. : )
This is the part of the falls you can’t see in the shot up there. It’s behind the ledge on the left. The brook sort of curves around it, making it damn hard to photograph. I brought my knee-high muck boots and got in the water just once since it was deeper and faster than I remembered.
And now for the wildflowers part of our show. First up, painted trillium. I’ve shot them before, but just look at ’em. Could you resist? Just before I put this shot together I made a couple images in a standard sort of way and liked them well enough, but thought they were kinda repetitive. So I took the camera off the tripod and set it on a nearby stump and lo, this composition came together. I just love the intimacy of it and those drops off the leaves are such a bonus. Ah the forest after rain.
Look what else is blooming – wild geranium! There were scads of it nearer the coast in a couple of spots and even though it was hanging out with tons of poison ivy, I had to try for some images. The one I had in my catalog was sheer crap so I braved the ivy and got one that doesn’t suck.
These are challenging to shoot in a couple ways. First is that like a lot of other flowers, the least little breeze makes them wave around like they’re doing some mad dance. Waiting for the lull is the worst part of shooting them. I swear that poison ivy was inching toward me angling for a pounce. The second thing is getting the color right. Try as I might, I couldn’t quite get it right in camera with a white balance setting. They were too blue or too orange. So I set it close and then processed by memory. These next ones had a similar problem although they are a different shade of pink. I’d never seen them before and found out that they’re an introduced species from Europe. Pretty little things though. They were in a river flood plain and I took a zillion shots to get one that worked. Oh that wind! It conspires against me. LOL.
Anyway, that’s it for now. I have a few more flower shots, but I haven’t processed them yet so they’ll have to hang fire for a bit. Hope you all can get out and enjoy the bounty of spring, too.
Beautiful! The ferns and mossy rocks are gorgeous in that second shot.
I have an online friend who lives in France where they have no poison ivy. After discussing the plant with him, he now speaks of the “Jungles of Ohio” where just brushing up against the wrong plant can do you harm.
I loved your photos. Whenever I take a flower photo, I usually take multiple photos hoping at least one will come out. When I’m hiking and taking wildflower photos, I never have a tripod with me. Since it’s shady and the shutter speeds are longish, I do need to stabilize the camera. So this is what I do. I pick up a stick and hold it vertically with my left fist. Then I balance my camera on top of my fist for a makeshift mini-monopod. I’ve actually started tucking a chopstick alongside my waterbottle to use the same way.