Shadow

Sometimes a simple shadow can produce a dramatic image.
I went outside this morning to photograph the forsythia petals I had been looking at out my window for the past week and thinking about how to shoot them--actually to post on my other blog, Recovery Thru My Lens. 

When I finally got out there with my camera, I looked through the viewfinder (yes, I still use it), saw my shadow and started to move out of the way. Then I envisioned some dynamic images that my friend, Robyn has been posting on her blog, Through the Healing Lens, that she calls Pain Shadow, and stayed put.

Here is the result. When I reviewed the 10 frames taken, I found this one most interesting; how it appears like I'm attached to the tree and how the greatest concentration of petals fall within the outline of my head and arm supporting the camera.

Coincidence or not, you tell me?

Lanterns

As the harbinger of spring, forsythia is one of my favorite plants. Its delicate flowers and wispy branches appear magically like feathers just as the birds start chirping.
Throughout the torrential rain that hammered the East End this past week, however, I feared that spring would never come. Fortunately I had a project on the computer that kept me busy indoors for hours. But one evening I was so stiff I found myself knocking on a friend's door to ask if I could use her yoga studio.
As I waited on the doorstep, I noticed tiny yellow buds hanging from a branch that reminded me of teardrops. Pitted against the gloomy gray dusk, they cheered me somehow, seemed to be planted there to let me know that brighter times were ahead.
Originally I called this post Teardrops, but when a subscriber said they looked more like the little lanterns strung across yards in the summer, I agreed and changed the title.
To achieve this effect I opted for a shallow depth of field by selecting a F5.6 and focused carefully on the pedals, throwing the background into a blur.