Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Week 8 - Day 55, June 24, 2009, "A Study of Light"



I had an amazing photo shoot today by looking very closely at light. I was thinking about the sun on the way home. As I walked from my office to the bus stop, I thought about how harsh the sunlight was. Many times I don't like to take photos at this time unless it is in the shade. Instead I concentrated on shadows, and took a few photographs. I think I'm on to something, and will work on this for a future photo of the day.

Later as I was walking Tank, I was looking through our overgrown apple orchard. In the darkest parts where the myrtle is a very plush ground cover I noticed that the light was reflecting off the waxy leaves similar to the way it reflects off of water. I rushed home to get my camera, and was back in about 3 minutes. Tried as I might, I couldn't find what I had just seen a few minute before. It was then I realized that the sun moving across the dense branches were causing very rapid changes in the lighting. I spent the next 30 minutes of time photographing and observering the light. Each angle presented a different view. (Way to state the obvious, Steve.) A straight on shot, looking East to West, would create a similar effect to the light bounching off of water. A staight on shot, looking West to East, would produce a yellow color. Views from the side would give a green look. I think there is great potential in spending some time trying to optimize the light for the various effects. I'm sure I'll be back in the future.

Although very dark, I really like this shot. It almost has a black and white look to it, but there are hints of green. Click on the image for a larger view so that you can see the details. I'm not sure if Waldo is in this shot, but let me know if you see him.

I hope you're not getting sick of myrtle, but I think it has a lot of potential for some great photography.

Lessons Learned:

  • See above

Photo details: Exposure time .5 sec, Aperture f/22.0, ISO 100, Focal Length 22 mm, 35 mm equivalent focal length 65mm, Lens Canon EF 17-40mm, tripod.

3 comments:

Gary's third pottery blog said...

myrtle has that gorgeous light blue flower too!

Karen (formerly kcinnova) said...

It does indeed look like water.

Light and Voices said...

Agreed, your photograph of myrtle does take on the appearance of water. Neato!
Joyce