This weekend when I visited Green Spring Gardens I was shocked to see that not a single lotus flower was blooming, given that so many were blooming recently at nearby Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens. As I looked in vain for a flower, I somehow became fascinated with the shapes of the leaves of the lotus plants and their interplay with the light and captured these almost abstract images.
These images are definitely different from the ones that I normally post, but I thought I would share them to show you what unexpectedly caught my eye that day.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Really like these, Mike!
Thanks, Chris. On rare occasions I will step way out of my comfort zone and try something completely different. I was pretty happy to be able to capture some of the details of what attracted me to the leaves (and especially the light and the shadows).
You did well!
That second one appeals to me most — what a great image.
How did you get those shots?
I was lot to the ground and the sun was shining almost directly at me, so I used spot metering to try to get the leaves properly exposed. The backlight helped reveal some of the structure of the leaves in one shot. In the other shot, there was a strong sidelight from the sun and the spotmetering caused the background to go to almost black (otherwise the stem would have almost certainly been blown out and lost all details).