back garden safari

Summertime, and the photography ain't easy.  (I'm sure I've written that line before.)

Doubley so this year, as bone pain has rendered me largely immobile so even if I could get out and about at the extremes of the day it was incredibly uncomfortable.  So I didn't!

Well, I did get one landscape shot at Dunraven Bay and as I'm writing this (on 29 August) I'm contemplating an astro shoot tonight if I can stay awake long enough.  (edit - I couldn't!)

But I have been able to do some image-making.  Late summer sun brought out the best in our garden, and with the temperatures more comfortable than they were back in July I grabbed my camera, put on some JJC macro extension tubes along with my 35mm lens and sallied forth into the grandeur of my country pile.  OK, my tiny back garden.

But when you're taking pictures of tiny objects, size really doesn't matter.  What does is the ability to focus through a razor-thin depth of field and hold a camera steady while doing so.  I'm not terribly good at either, but among the largely bang average images I shot I did manage to get three I'm really happy with.

I admit there is a degree of artistic cropping involved, but that's all the editing I did in Lightroom.

I find it amazing that something as inconsequential as a tiny flower is constructed with such precision and care.  You do wonder if there is some greater power behind it all.  A greater power with an army of designers and engineers, granted!!

Lobelia
Fujifilm X-T4, Fujinon XF35mm f2, JJC Macro Extension Tubes
1/20th of a second @ f11, ISO 800
handheld

Pennisetum
Fujifilm X-T4, Fujinon XF35mm f2, JJC Macro Extension Tubes
1/250th of a second @ f8, ISO 160
handheld

Verbena
Fujifilm X-T4, Fujinon XF35mm f2, JJC Macro Extension Tubes
1/45th of a second @ f2, ISO 800
handheld

You can watch a video about making these and some other images below.  Go on, you know you want to...