Cherry blossom pond

click photo to enlarge

"Are we to look at cherry blossoms only in full bloom, the moon only when it is cloudless?  To long for the moon while looking on the rain, to lower the blinds and be unaware of the passing of the spring - these are even more deeply moving.  Branches about to blossom or gardens strewn with flowers are worthier of our admiration."
Yoshida Kenko (c.1283-c.1350), Japanese author and Buddhist monk

Look at photographs and paintings of flowers and you'll find that the vast majority depict them in full bloom. Perfect flowers are generally thought to be best to represent on canvas or in print. Buds of flowers-to-be and the dying blooms of flowers past are viewed as less than perfect; the former because they hold only promise, the latter because they remind us of what was and what all life becomes. And yet, a small proportion of painters and photographers choose to show flowers before or past their peak. Why? Well, it's often because we are sated with images of perfection. Or that, in what can seem to some an odd way, we admire the look of beauty marred by imperfection and the symbolism of both promise and decay. Faded beauty prompts different thoughts than does the full flush of youth or maturity, thoughts with a poignant and melancholy edge that those of a Romantic persuasion enjoy. The quotation above by Kenko, a contemporary of Dante, reminds us that we can find beauty and something worth admiring in less than perfect circumstances.

It's feelings of this sort that prompt my annual photographs of emerging and dying water lily leaves and led me to photograph some hydrangeas that I found past their best in a church. The cherry blossom on this pond in Billingborough, Lincolnshire, probably provoked many photographs when it was on the tree, yet on the water it has its attractions too. I've photographed this subject before using a longer focal length. For today's shot I selected a wider angle to capture the beauty of the reflections and the massed pink petals before they discoloured and were subject to the decay that afflicts all living things.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 35mm
F No: f11
Shutter Speed: 1/500
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Killing time

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The other day I was in the village of Billingborough, Lincolnshire on business. I had some time to kill so I walked around the outside of the medieval church and gazed up at its spire with its slender flying buttresses. As I'd done on a couple of previous occasions I stood before a selection of slate gravestones dating from the eighteenth century and marvelled at how sharp and clear the carving remained after two hundred and fifty years or more. And how light, elaborate and elegant the lettering, flourishes and decoration was compared with that of the Victorian period. I took a few photographs of the gravestones, the church and a nearby house - variations on images I'd recorded before. Then, with the muse of photography absent, and with some time still left before my appointment, I decided to get a cup of coffee and sit by the village pond whilst I drank it.

As I sat there, watching a moorhen feeding chicks that dashed over the surface of the water like little motor boats, I noticed cherry blossom falling from a tree that was overhanging the pond. The petals settled on the water, and sat there there with curves of surface tension all around them. A light breeze was blowing, slowly gathering them into little flotillas of pink that, joining up with others, grew into veritable armadas that the wind started to bank up against the shore, making them look like a floral invasion fleet. It was then I thought, "There's a photograph somewhere here!" So I moved around the edge of the pond composing images of the pink shapes against the reflected trees and sky. When I'd finished, feeling confident that I'd captured an image that I liked, I reflected that one of the great pleasures of photography is that on those days when you can't find images, the answer can be to stop looking and let the images find you!!

photograph & text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 150mm (300mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f8
Shutter Speed: 1/125
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On