Let's Do 52 ~ Week 21 {Closer} or Photography Lessons I Learned From My Dad

I've always said that my love for photography was planted in my brain by my dad many moons ago.  He taught me a lot about how to use a camera, but there were three main points that he really drove home for me:

1.  There is no substitute for light.  You gotta' have it and you can't fake it.

Totally true.  Trust me.  I can't tell you how many shots I've fuuu...dged trying to fake the light.  Literally thousands.

2.  Take about 10 shots and you'll get a good one.

Also totally true.  10%.  That's what I tell people.  If you can't get 10% you should really just put the camera down and find something else to do.  But, then when you get 25% it's like a little surprise party on your memory card.  Yay!

3.  You really don't need a zoom lens.  Just get closer.

Unless you're standing at the edge of the Grand Canyon or something, or a football field, or outside your kid's classroom on the first day of school and his teacher hears you clicking away in the hall and sends your kid out to invite you in and he comes out to ask, but at the same time gives you the stank eye that says, 

If you even set one foot in here, I'll punch you in the throat.  

In that case, you absolutely need a zoom lens,

but if you're just photographing flowers in your backyard,

you don't.

Just get closer.

Love from,

Let's Do 52 ~ Week 15 {Stackable}

Okay...I feel like I need to preface this image by saying this is my EXTREMELY LOOSE interpretation of the theme.

Mainly because my kids are home on Spring Break this week, and, short of me tying them up and laying them on top of each other, I'm probably not going to have much of a chance to stack anything...

...Except maybe aspirin tablets...

...Or wine bottles...

But, I think I may be giving you the wrong impression.  I love Spring Break.  It means a whole week of not having to get up early and fight with anyone to get out the door.  It means that we're on the downhill slide of the school year and summer is on its way.

It also means that the tulip festival opens and the flowers start blooming.

See what I did there?  That subtle transition?  I know.  I'm a born writer.

I saw something like this in the gift shop at one of the tulip gardens.  They used a ceramic frame printed with a wide angle photo then added in a print of a close up image of the same flowers.  The effect was pretty cool, and I thought I'd give it a try....minus the frame....and the $47 price tag.

Of course, the only way to do that was to....say it with me...STACK THEM!

I know...I was born to do this.

Love,

L.

Flower of the Month

I go back and forth on my favorite flower.  Sometimes it's pink Gerbra daisies.  Sometimes it's bright, yellow sunflowers.  I do like roses, but I'd take a daffodil over those any day of the week.

But from April 1st until the 30th, my favorite flora has to be tulips....especially if they're at Roozengarde.

Blossom Beauties

Yeah! 

The first blooms are popping out on the trees in my front yard!  I love that.  

It's such a sign that spring is on its way.  I've been watching for these little bursts of pink to appear.  I first started seeing them a couple of days ago, but it was so rainy and windy that I couldn't get out there to shoot them.  This morning, though, the light was on them, the rain stopped for just a moment, and the wind was being somewhat cooperative.  I grabbed my step-ladder, propped it up just off the curb and set my focus on those orange beauties right in the center. 

Wowza!  B-E-A-U-tiful! 

And if you know me at all, you know that I usually spend thousands of pixels each March on these buds.  Photographing until I'm sick of them.   

No!  No more petals.  No more half-open blooms.  

No more moss-covered branches blurring out in the background.  

Move on!! 

 And then we spend our summer months engulfed in rain, and our fall months engulfed in rain, and most of our winter months engulfed in rain.  Unless, of course, we're waiting for snow which usually starts falling and then turns to rain.  So that by the time we reach spring again, I'm so starved for any other color than gray, that I'll once more spend all of my pixels on these little babies.

 So, just a warning...

There will be LOTs more like this coming in the near future.  I'm just sure of it. 

I {heart} you, pink!

I {heart} you, petals and flowers!

I {heart} you, moss covered branches blurring out into the background!

I {heart} you, Spring!

Pink

Blossoms

These trees were so late in blooming last year. It was almost April before they started showing up. This year, however, with our mild weather, their color came out in February. I've taken hundreds of them in the last 6 weeks.  Seriously, hundreds......and I think I might be done. 

Oh, and P.S.....All but one of these was done off the trees in my front yard.....