What I post today are macro lens photographs of a crepe myrtle. Some of them are a little creepy, but in a lovely way. The organic structure of these plants looks a bit unsettling, to me anyway. It has a somewhat alien feel. But it’s just nature doing what nature does, whatever it wants.
Today I took several stills I shot in succession of a crepe myrtle tree using my macro lens. I noticed while shooting that as I adjusted the focus it created an interesting kaleidoscopic effect. So I decided t to do a little experiment. I took a couple frames and put them into video. Sadly I didn’t get nearly enough frames to really feel like the effect was all it could be, so I looped it up a few times ti give it a little more substance. Next time I hope I remember this lesson and get many more frames to work with.
As I am a hobbyist, there was no planning that went into this endeavor. I just got an itch and grabbed my rig and went outside. In my next blog post I will have several stills from this endeavor, which turned out very nicely. I was very pleased with this little session that spontaneously happened a couple days ago.
In the near future I may do some kind of shoot with the goal of a much longer kaleido loop. Bring the tripod for some stability and consistency of frame and just shoot a ton of stills while racking the focus. This sounds like fun.
This post has more macro shots. I’ve been playing around with my macro lens lately. For the record it is Tokina AT-X M100 PRO D Macro 100mm f2.8 AF.
Shooting close-up macro is a different kind of challenge than other styles. One need not use a macro lens for only close-ups though. It’s just what I think of most when I think of photography with a macro lens. Close up stuff is what I’ve been concentrating on lately, but I am curious and interested in doing some other longer macro photography. Hopefully I’ll get to do that in the near future.
This set of pix are some extreme close ups of a yarn quilt. I’m not sure what kind of yarn it is. My Mom made it, so I need to ask her. Judging form these frames, I’d guess it is some kind of synthetic blend. I don’t know. I was struggling with ideas for some extreme close up subjects. I’m always struggling to think of interesting subjects. Anyway, this seemed like a good idea. It turned out kinda cool. It’s not particularly dynamic, but it is very colorful. From vibrant to more muted there is a lot of different color here. I played around with lighting while shooting these. It was an educational experience. I used some gels, which turned out pretty cool. I think I like the gelled shots the best here.
There is also a lot of texture to be had in this set. I do very much like texture. It is useful for layered backgrounds and overlays and such. These are all the full frame without cropping. If you crop and zoom the texture is quite different looking. I make these fairly low resolution for the blog though, so if you zoom too much you will loose some detail that is there otherwise.
It’s been some time since my last post. I have been busy. Not many a day goes by without me having done something, which isn’t particularly noteworthy really, but does have a way of consuming time and energy. I suppose most adult types know this. However I do try to do things I want to in the process of doing the things I have to. And I did manage to some some good things since my last post. A couple of which I am going to show you now. Like it or not. Yes a couple of these shots are possibly scary to someone, but tough. After all, I’ll probably be the only person to ever see them anyway, as is the case with my tens of thousands of other shots. Yes many of which are simply different variations of the same thing. But as I’ve posted about in the past, sometimes it’s difficult to pick the best one. Sometimes a great many are very good, and only my discretion is used as to what I post publicly for, pretty much no one else, to look at and enjoy.
I am trying to approach this blog with an emphasis on photographs I’ve made, and thoughts on them. I have and probably will in the future posted more personal thoughts and observations. I have so many. Part of my time and energy consumption is on thinking and observing. I guess most people would say I’m just a stupid dreamer, and that my time is wasted. When looked at in the mores of out time, and most times, human culture is a completely selfish, materialistic culture where greed and accumulation are the ultimate goals in life, those people are right, I am a dreamer. That is in part why I concentrate my time on photography where the dream can become material. I suppose that is a major motivation for many artists, whether they realize it or not. I know I always knew that on some level, but never really thought it out like this before. And that is a part of why I enjoy writing, as it structures my thoughts and dreams in a material way, instead of the ephemeral torrent of things that go though my mind at times. It’s really a damn damn shame all the interesting things I’ve though of that are lost to the ether.
So this part of the dream is kind of a nightmare I suppose. At least maybe for some people. I find this type of thing fascinating and beautiful in its way. I recently had a prompt to think about using my macro lens. Macro photography is something I’ve always appreciated. And insects have always been a big part of the style. I remember as a child looking at the insane detail and art of insect physiology detailed in macro photography, when on rare occasions I was privy to such delights. I am so glad that my parents encouraged curiosity and learning. I remember spending much time in various issues of the National Geographic magazines I had access to. I can’t remember if our family had a subscription or just managed to get a copy now and then. It was probably the latter. But I do remember reading the article and soaking up the imagery. Which brings me to these few macro photos I present for your enjoyment. It’s just some bugs from in my back yard. I don’t have vast resources to stage anything like this, just pure random happenstance, and the motivation to break out my rig, which can be difficult to overcome at times. So it’s nowhere near National Geographic quality, but I enjoy it none-the-less.
I have some totally different style macro shots to talk about in my next post.