Hydrangea arborescens "Annabelle"

click photo to enlarge
The same flower photographed under different lighting conditions can produce photographs with quite different qualities. The other day I was photographing Hydrangea arborescens "Annabelle", the most popular cultivar of the Smooth Hydrangea of eastern North America, a variety that is quite hardy and valued because of its large white blooms. It grows in semi-shade in our garden near a large willow tree and at this time of year it gets intermittent direct sunlight.

My shots were taken with a 100mm macro lens and the camera was mounted on a tripod. The main photograph was taken when the sun was out but the bloom was in shade. Here the bright but diffuse light was above and the shade from the tree helped to reveal the detail of each petal. The smaller photograph has the camera lower down, shooting upwards, with the light behind the petals. A sheet of white vinyl gives the white background and reflects a bit of light onto the subject. The aperture on that shot is f4 against the f16 of the main photograph and the shallower depth of field adds to the "dreamier" quality that it exhibits, something that I think complements the brightness.

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Photo 1
Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 100mm macro
F No: f16
Shutter Speed: 0.8 sec
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: Off

Pink and black

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Pink always seems to me to be the right colour for carnations (Dianthus) because their colloquial name is "pinks". These flowers come in a range of colours yet pink, to my eye, is just the right colour to go with the blue-tinged green of the stalks, thin leaves and buds.

I think I've said elsewhere in this blog that pink is a colour that I never especially liked but, as I've aged, it has grown on me. It's a colour that cries out to be paired with another colour. I like to see it with turquoise or grey though I'm not fond of the popular pairing with red or purple. When I came to take this photograph of some pink carnations in a vase in our hall I opted for a black background. Pink and black are often put together quite successfully. In this instance it allows the relatively muted colour to display an intensity that it loses when other colours are paired with it, and makes the most of the outline of the blooms. The trouble is that that pink and black have a particular association in my mind, one that I can't shift. Such things are very powerful and can prevent one seeing something for what it is. For example, I can't see the colour mint green alongside brown without thinking of a dessert (pudding) that we had in primary school - chocolate sponge with mint flavoured (and coloured) sauce.

So what association pops into my head when I see pink and black. Nothing less than Bassett's Liquorice Allsorts, a sweet of my childhood, still available today, though one I haven't tasted for decades!

photograph and text © Tony Boughen

Camera: Canon
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 100mm macro
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/80 sec
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation:  -0.33 EV
Image Stabilisation: Off

Soft sky at Aldeburgh

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When, many years ago, I first started to take a deeper interest in photography I began to think more about the weather, and particularly about the sky. Until I put more thought and effort into my pictures the importance of these two things hadn't really struck me. I'd read about light being the key to good images, and had seen how light can transform the mundane into something special. But, in every example that illustrated this point in magazines and books (no web then) it was either sunlight or flash that was the light source working its magic. Contre jour lighting, a low sun, flash pointed at the camera, deliberate flare, deep shadows contrasted with illuminated areas, and other techniques were very alluring, and fixed in my mind the value of a bright light source as a way of achieving drama.

What was never said, or at least I never read, was that soft, natural light, the sort of light that is spread evenly across a scene by a thick covering of cloud, can also lend a scene a delightful quality that has an appealing, understated beauty. But, over the years, I came to appreciate this kind of light and the weather that produces it. However, not just any old clouds will do. Low, uniform, stratus offers little to the photographer: the clouds have to have shape and shadows or include thinner, brighter areas. When this happens the colours on the land below are muted and highlights are few; the landscape can appear to have been drawn on dark paper with pastel crayons. A couple of days ago I had one of these skies as I was photographing on the beach at Aldeburgh in Suffolk. The shot I secured could never be described as dramatic, but it does have that calm, subdued softness that I like.

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 19mm (38mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f5
Shutter Speed: 1/800
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.3 EV
Image Stabilisation: On

Victoria plums and natural light

click photo to enlarge

If, in a simplistic kind of way, we divide the year into four equal length seasons, and we assign three months to each of them, then technically the arrival of September brings autumn. Yet early September, especially when, as recently, the days are warm and sunny, not only feels like summer, it IS summer (albeit the tail-end). Consequently we are not yet into Keats' "season of mists and mellow fruitfulness". Except, in terms of fruit trees, we are. Most confusing.

We've had a few calls recently - in person and by phone - asking if we'd like some plums. This year's harvest is exceptional, and anyone with a plum tree seems to have more than they can manage. We've got one, and consequently the kind offers have had to be declined, and we have spent some time furnishing friends and neighbours with our own surplus fruit.

Today's photograph shows part of a basket of our Victoria plums in the utility room. Some of them were given to visitors, the rest turned into puddings or frozen. I saw the plums illuminated by the early morning sun filtering through the Venetian blinds, and the deep colour and lustrous surfaces simply cried out for a photograph. As I've said elsewhere in this blog, though I possess three flash guns, my strong preference whenever possible, is to use natural light. There are those who are sufficiently skilled with artificial lighting that they can simulate (or almost simulate) natural light. I'm not one of those: I have neither the technique nor the desire. Moreover, natural light is often so wonderfully captivating, one of life's pleasures in fact, that I can't see the point in trying to replicate it with a flash or other lights. Perhaps if I made my living by photography and was subject to external pressures to deliver I'd see it differently. But fortunately I don't, and I can point my camera at whatever takes my fancy - including these plums of late summer. Or is it early autumn?

photograph and text (c) T. Boughen

Camera: Lumix LX3
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 5.1mm (24mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f2.8
Shutter Speed: 1/250
ISO: 80
Exposure Compensation: -1.0 EV
Image Stabilisation: On