A pink rose at Wal-Mart’s garden center, covered in water drops.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/30, F2.8, 5.8mm, ISO100, 2005-10-23T07:52:43-04, 2005-10-23_07h52m43

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

Hybrid lilies at Wal-Mart. Photo from 2005. As all of the 2005 photos I am posting this month, this is a new edit with a lot of extra color and contrast.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/132, F2.8, 5.8mm, ISO64, 2005-10-24T14:12:34-04, 2005-10-24_14h12m34

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A macro of pink flowers with water drops, using the flash. Photo from 2005.

Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/30, F2.8, 5.8mm, ISO100, 2005-10-10T07:33:41-04, 2005-10-10_07h33m41

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The 3rd of 9 portraits of Amour. She’s stopping to smell the roses… or petunias, or whatever these blue flowers are.

The flowers and mulch was planted there, the flower in her hair is fake, and she’s wearing a dress and makeup, but I still say she’s with nature.

For editing I removed some freckles from Amour’s arm (spot healing brush), darkened the corners, added contrast, brightened her face, and toned down the greens a bit.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/1600, F2.8, 50mm, ISO200, 2009-11-02T09:58:38-05, 20091102-145838rxt

I was thinking of adding a big picture of Hugh Laurie in the background… but it’s not that House. Just blue flowers with a house in the background. I think the house is for sale.

This is a weird angle. I’m not sure if it works well, but it seems different. The sky was dark as though it was going to rain. I made the colors warmer on the computer. If they’re too blue the scene feels cold. The focus is on the flowers at the back, so the ones at the bottom are blurry.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/125, F4.5, 50mm, ISO100, 2009-10-16T17:07:31-04, 20091016-210731rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

These yellow orchids represent friendship only. I found these in someone’s front yard while going for a walk. I tried taking a picture from a high angle to just show grass in the background, but it wasn’t nearly as pretty as a flower-level shot.

There is a house behind the flowers, but it’s blurred out because I used a large aperture (F2.8). I changed the white balance to be less warm, added brightness, and sharpened on the computer, along with the standard darkening of the corners (vignetting).

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/250, F2.8, 50mm, ISO100, 2009-10-16T16:57:41-04, 20091016-205741rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

Light-blue flowers by a rustic wooden fence. Composed using the rule of thirds!

I was having some problems with wind… the petals of the flower at the back would get blown up during a breeze which looked ugly. I pushed the petals down and snapped this quickly, while also considering composition and contrast. I had to be careful to keep the flowers from being over-exposed. Faster shutter speed or smaller aperture (higher F number) = less light.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/125, F2.8, 50mm, ISO100, 2009-10-16T16:55:37-04, 20091016-205537rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

Small blue flowers, sharply focused through a fence. The Canon EF 50mm F1.4 lens has good focus… you just have to close the aperture up a bit. I used F3.2. It’s hard to see if the image is sharp in the viewfinder. I zoom in afterward on the LCD screen and see if the subject looks sharp. The flowers weren’t extremely sharp because digital SLRs don’t sharpen much, but I sharpened this on the computer.

These flowers are behind a chain-link fence by someone’s sidewalk. If you just walk around with a camera you’ll find photo opportunities like this. There is no reason to spend thousands of dollars traveling if you’re just going to photograph nature and still life. You have plenty of still life around you.

I could have got down on the ground instead of shooting the flowers from above, but the house was painted bright white. I did not want it in the frame… just other flowers, bushes, and grass.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/125, F3.2, 50mm, ISO100, 2009-10-16T16:42:25-04, 20091016-204225rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

White flowers on top of a green plant out back of the cafeteria at Daytona State College (main campus).

On auto my Canon Rebel XTi over-exposed the flowers majorly; I had to set the exposure bias way down to get them in range. I’ve titled this “Dark Sunshine” because everything but the flowers is dark.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/2000, F4.5, 50mm, ISO100, 2009-09-18T15:43:44-04, 20090918-194344rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.

Pink flowers in a garden in the trailer park near our house. I like the look of these flowers; they have a pink hue mixed with cool blue, unlike pink roses which are generally more warm. Of course this all depends on white balance and editing, but these flowers look good in cool colors while roses don’t.

“Cool” colors are bluish; “warm” colors are yellowish. This photo might be closer to neutral, but I pick warm colors over cool colors in most of my photos so it’s subjectively cool.

Canon Rebel XTi, EF 28-135mm, 1/30, F5.6, 135mm, ISO800, 2009-09-12T07:19:48-04, 20090912-111948rxt

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.