A Flowering Shrub One May Morning /  by Todd Henson

I don’t know why, but sometimes it seems spring is the shortest season. Perhaps because that’s when there’s so much new growth and flowering that I just can’t find the time to see and photograph it all, and so it feels as if it passes quickly. But as ephemeral as it may be, and perhaps because of this, I cherish it.

Down along one of the creeks we frequent the vines and shrubs are quickly taking over again, sending out new growth, sometimes full of thorns, or in this case full of flowers (and sometimes both). Just after traversing a bridge over the creek I noticed a clustering of flowers down a small incline, so I made my way down and began exploring. The first two photographs in this post came from that area.

A calm moment one May morning

For the first photograph I just loved the simplicity of the white flowers with the green leaves against the darker background. I spent a little time exploring, looking for a pleasing composition. I settled for this one, with the branches coming in from the right and a slight angle to the leaves next to the blossoms.

Light white blooms

I kept exploring that area and found another cluster a little more in the open, letting some light fall beside and behind the petals, giving them a soft glow. I was drawn to the delicate nature of this scene.

A little over an hour later we found ourselves on an old dirt road now serving as a trail with trees, shrubs and vines growing up along each side creating this beautifully straight path through the greenery of spring. This stretch was also covered in the same type of shrub I’d photographed earlier, but the light was different as we were in a more shaded area. As we walked one particular composition jumped out at me. I didn’t have to work much for it as it was right there, almost as if it were daring me to stop and photograph it. So I did.

Mid-May blooms

I very much like the variety in this image, how the white flower on the left is similar to those in the previous image, but the flower to the right has some vivid yellow to it, while the unopened buds are a very light pink. I think I also like that there are fewer open blossoms in this one, making for a slightly simpler image. As a bonus, if you look very closely you may notice many insects hidden throughout the photo, blending in very well with the greenery.

I’m not certain of the species of these shrubs, but I suspect they may be wild blackberry or something similar. In time perhaps we’ll find out if we happen by when they’re producing fruit. We have noticed other berries along the trail, like blueberries, so I’d imagine this area is popular with wildlife.

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Lots of Lovely Lady’s Slippers /  by Todd Henson

A pink lady’s slipper, also sometimes called a moccasin flower

One of the joys of photographing nature is stumbling upon species in the wild for perhaps the first time. And when it comes to flowers that can be all the more special as some are only there for a very short period of time once a year. This year I was fortunate to be hiking with my father who has a keen eye and noticed several pink lady’s slippers right beside the trail hiding along the forest floor. And as is often the case, once we’d noticed one we began finding more. They were very difficult to photograph as most were in challenging locations and often mixed in with other more distracting plants or forest floor debris. But I had such a great time attempting to create some nice photographs with what nature presented us.

Lady’s slipper quartet

Lone lady’s slipper

There are several variety of lady’s slippers, also sometimes called moccasin flowers, one of the more common being pink lady’s slippers. All of the photos in this post are of pink lady’s slippers. They are a fairly large flower compared to most wildflowers in the area. And as you may tell from the look of them, they are of the orchid family. From what I’ve read it appears they flower between May and July, and all of these were found within the first two weeks of May (2021).

Pink lady’s slipper profile

Profile of a pink lady’s slipper

Fascinatingly, it can take years for a plant to mature from a seed. And, I suppose, that being the case it shouldn’t be too surprising that plants can live for over twenty years, though I am impressed by that. Being orchids, they are rather needy plants, requiring a particular soil fungus to grow. The lady’s slipper and the fungus have a symbiotic relationship, each benefiting from the other. They requires bees for pollination and, again, being an orchid, they have a rather complex method of attracting and being pollinated by the bees, which must enter the flower from one direction and exit from another where they will deposit any pollen they’re already carrying from other plants and pick up any from this one. Apparently they can sometimes perish inside the flower if they’re unable to find their way to the exit, though I hope this is uncommon.

Lady’s slipper sextet (in the shade)

Lady’s slipper sextet (in the sun)

Each individual flower doesn’t last all that long, though I don’t know for certain their typical life span. Flowers that were fully in bloom one weekend were either withered and brown or already fallen to the forest floor by the following weekend. But there were also new flowers found. Perhaps we’ll be fortune and find more of these now that we know what to look for. Or perhaps we won’t and this will have been the blooming period of this area. Only time will tell, but I look forward to finding out.

The latter days of the lady’s slippers

Aging gracefully

I hope you’ve enjoyed this brief glimpse at this lovely wild orchid, the pink lady’s slipper. Click on any of the images for a larger view.

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Painterly Pursuits in Photography /  by Todd Henson

I was thinking about how sometimes painters create paintings that could be mistaken for photographs. And that naturally led me to thinking about how photographers sometimes create photographs that could be mistaken for paintings. And from there I began pondering some of the ways a photograph might be made to look painterly, many of which would involve heavy post-processing, likely using Photoshop to craft a painting out of a photo. But I also thought about the various ways a photograph could be made painterly mostly in camera with any post-processing occurring strictly in Lightroom.

And so I sought out a few photographs that I’d created with a more painterly intent, ones I’d not yet processed, and took them through Lightroom to finish them. Most of the post-processing is similar in nature to that I do with any other photograph, adjusting exposure, highlights, shadows, white and black points, white balance, color balance, etc. The majority of what makes these photos painterly was done in camera. I did, however, make adjustments in Lightroom that might be considered overkill for a typical photograph, things like over-saturating colors or pushing texture too much in one direction or the other (affecting contrast in interesting ways).

Trees in Autumn

The first photo used a simple technique to distort the scene, giving it the impression of paint brushed onto a canvas. How was it done? Some of you may guess by looking at the photo. I found a pond surrounded by bright autumn foliage and pointed the camera at the reflections in the water and experimented with various shutter speeds to see the different looks they gave. Some seemed to give the impression of brushed on paint, and in post processing I accentuated that by adjusting the contrast in various ways (texture, highlights, shadows, white and black point, etc). I also flipped the photo so the sky was at the top, as we’d see in the scene or a painting, but the opposite of what we typically see reflected in a pond.

Autumnal Abstract

For the second photo I once again took advantage of the reflections of the colorful autumn foliage, but this time I decided to go with a more abstract composition. I focused in on a small patch of color and patterns and zoomed in enough you can’t as easily tell what the subject is. Instead it’s just a painting about color and pattern. And this being the case I had no problem adjusting some of the colors in Lightroom, making some of them brighter and more vibrant.

Fiery Fall Foliage

Finally, for the third photo I decided to include the actual scene instead of just reflections. But I still wanted a painterly look. Thankfully, the scene, itself, had a painterly look to it with the late afternoon sun lighting up some of the colorful leaves across the pond. I was also creating a number of long exposures, letting any breeze slightly blur the leaves, while also sometimes experimenting with moving the zoom or focus ring during the exposure. If you move the zoom ring during exposure you can create some interesting streaks and blurs as you actually zoom into or out of the scene. By moving the focus ring during exposure you can similarly create some interesting blurs as you capture things in and out of focus at the same time. In this particular case I don’t think I moved either zoom or focus rings, instead just letting the breeze move some of the leaves around for the 1 second exposure. I then made further adjustments in Lightroom that contributed to the slightly blurry feel, and made some creative exposure adjustments beyond the already brightly illuminated foliage.

All of these photos also took advantage of a Singh-Ray Gold-n-Blue polarizing filter to shift and accentuate the colors even more. The trip to this pond was all about experimenting, about trying to use various techniques to alter the look and feel of the images, and in some cases perhaps creating photographs with a more painterly feel. I’ll let you decide whether or not I was successful.

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