dreamscaper's photostream  

Once again, I went to the Botanic Gardens to photograph. I wasn't sure I'd get anything interesting but wound up with 5 that I had to narrow down to one! This is it.

I shot more or less edge-on to a large fan palm frond/leaf that wasn't entirely open. I shot it several ways but this one was shot at one second while I panned slowly upward. For me, it sufficiently obscures what it "really" is and it becomes an abstraction.

In post-processing (mostly in Adobe Camera Raw), I set the fill light quite high and the contrast quite low. Also added less clarity than I usually would. For me, this enhances the abstraction.

I went to the Botanic Gardens, today (nice and warm in the "Orangerie"--where they have a large display of orchids so I had many potential subjects.

Most of the time I used my ring flash and mostly I concentrated on single blossoms. However, I liked this grouping. I toned down the blossoms in the distance near the right edge because they were pretty bright and also darkened the dark background at top and bottom to make them stand out more.

This is from the original capture of the image titled "Portal to the Past". It reminded me of a photographic negative.

I went to Fairmount Cemetery the day after this week's snow storm. Lots of interesting subjects. This was a stature that is part of a monument there.

This image caught my attention because the original looked so "negative-like". (See added image, below)

I played around with inverting it, as if it were a negative...and, then, I was off...! The above image was what I came up with. To me, it represents a ghostly figure that might be emerging through a gateway to the past.

Another, later, photo from my bouquet of cut flowers. This was shot from behind the flower with ambient light (ceiling lights) illuminating the front side of the flower. Shot with a 70-300 mm. zoom and 5T + 6T diopters to allow close focus. I liked the repetition of patterns and the contrast of color.