Raindrops in sunlight

click photo to enlarge
Recently overnight rain was followed by a sunny morning and the glistening foliage of the garden encouraged me to put my old 35mm 3.5 Four Thirds macro lens on its adapter and mount it on the camera. However, even as I walked around searching for a subject the warmth of the sun was visibly drying out the leaves. Consequently I headed for one of our our patches of Lady's Mantle (Alchemilla mollis), a plant that I had been meaning to avoid.

Alchemilla is the obvious choice for any photographer wanting to capture raindrops on foliage. The minute hairs of the leaves cause rain to form into myriad drops of varying sizes. However, I'd taken photographs of the attractively shaped leaves on a number of occasions and I wanted to try a different plant. But the sun's effects elsewhere forced me back to the Alchemilla. So, rather than concentrating on the leaves I searched out the drops themselves. This photograph shows them clustered on the ends of a group of leaves that had yet to fully open. I liked it for the contrast of the dark, shady background against which I could place some drops. The only thing I don't like about the shot is that it has something of the look of a studio photograph taken with flash. I recognise that not everyone shares my antipathy to such things, but for those who do I can assure you that this was taken in natural light, in the garden solely with the aid of a tripod.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo Title: Raindrops on Lady's Mantle Leaves
Camera: Olympus E-M10
Mode: Manual
Focal Length: 35mm Macro (70mm - 35mm equiv.) crop
F No: f11
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO:250
Exposure Compensation: 0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Lady's Mantle

click photo to enlarge

Lady's Mantle (Alchemilla mollis) is one of those plants that, once you have it, you need never be without it. It readily spreads from the original clump and is soon spotted, spreading itself around the garden. But it's also one of those plants that people either strongly like or equally strongly dislike. Those who have an aversion to it see only a low growing, leafy, green plant with relatively unspectacular, weed-like, yellow flowers, a perennial that multiplies where it isn't wanted and which becomes somewhat straggly at the end of the season. However, people who favour it admire the palmate shape of the leaves that were once thought to resemble the scalloped mantle once worn around the neck and over the shoulders of women (the Lady is the Virgin Mary). They also appreciate the effective ground cover that it provides and its hardiness. But lovers of the plant most especially like the way that multiple water droplets, looking like liquid mercury, bead on the leaves after rain or a heavy dew.

This latter characteristic happens because of the small, soft hairs that cover the leaves. These beautiful drops of water caught the eye of the medieval alchemists (hence the Latin name) who, it is reputed, judged it the purest form of water and employed it in their attempts to turn base metal into gold. The plant in today's photograph has frequently been dotted with these jewel-like spots of water due to the frequency of rain in Britain this spring and summer. I took my hand-held shot after a particularly heavy downpour, just as the sky brightened for a short period before the onset of the next deluge.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 100mm macro
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO: 125
Exposure Compensation:  0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On