The Lady Jane tulips (Tulipa clusiana “Lady Jane”) in the garden of my neighbor and photography mentor Cindy Dyer are now fully in bloom. In a recent post called Two tulips, I featured a side view of a mostly closed flower, highlighting the tulip’s unusual shape and reddish-pink color. This time, I shot almost straight down from above and was struck by the geometric shapes in the petals, the stamen, and even the stigma (the little three-lobed part in the very center of the flower). For the middle shot, I shot from a slight angle to give a somewhat more natural perspective.
I hope that all of you are staying safe and healthy. I am remaining close to home most of the time and it has been a blessing for me to be able to find such beautiful subjects to photograph almost literally across the street—Cindy and I live at opposite sides of a suburban semi-circle.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
Nice portraits of this beautiful flower, Mike!
Gorgeous photos, Mike. I especially like the first one.
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Thanks, Mitzy. That one is my favorite too–I like the way that the curling green in the lower left looks like part of a leaf and stem of an upright flower.
Beautiful, Mike. The bottom one is so unexpectedly triangular. I really like it, but I think the top one is my favorite. I’m a sucker for symmetry.
Thanks, Michael. This is not as abstract as many of your images, but it’s pretty abstract for me. :). The symmetry in that first shot is almost perfect, both in the petals and the stamens, plus the curling green in the lower left gives the illusion that somehow the flower is upright.
Beautifulshots, Mike. Love the delicate balance of light in these and the fine details.
Thanks, Pete. Shooting macro is always fun. I was doing it handheld with my 180mm macro lens, which does not have image stabilization, so I always have to pay a lot of attention to my technique to get relatively sharp shots.
You did real good handheld and without image stabilization, Mike. I always shoot handheld but do have image stabilization on my 105mm macro, and sometimes I add a Raynox converter lens to the end of that, but I still have to try and brace myself on anything that may be near by, especially as you get to the tiny critters 🙂
Beautiful work, Mike. The three and three remind me of trilliums but, of course, the wrong number of stamens.
A lovely specimen!
Thanks, Eliza. My neighbor has about 20 of them blooming right now in her front yard.
That’s a pretty tulip!
Thanks.
Very Nice Mike! Beautiful images!
Thanks, Reed. It’s nice to be playing with my macro lens again after letting it gather dust over the winter. 🙂
It is so wonderful to see this breath of Spring in your beautiful photos. Presently the only burst of color in my corner of Rhode Island are the vibrant yellow blooms of the Forsythia bushes. Small ones have spread across the entire strip of land above the stone fence in the backyard, most likely from the very large one that is in the side yard for over a decade. I cannot wait for the tulips and daffodils to bloom. Cindy’s are lovely! If I had to choose a favorite of the three photos it would be either the first or the third, each has its charm! Thank-you, Mr. Mike!
Thanks. Forsythia’s were one of my Mom’s favorites. She transplanted some when she and my Dad moved to Maine from Massachusetts. I think we tend to be a month or so ahead of New England in terms of the seasons.
I hope your usual haunts have not been closed. Our Seneca Creek State Park is still open, but yesterday it was kind of crowded (still PLENTY of space to spread out though) and a ranger mentioned they might have to close the gate. Even if they do that, we can walk in from our neighborhood, so we will still be able to commune with nature. We are fortunate in so many ways.
Lovely tulip shots. Ours are not open yet.
The Governor of Virginia has issued a stay-at-home order, so I don’t think I will be able to go to my normal haunts for a while.
Same here in MD. We can walk into SCSP from our neighborhood, so I hope we will be able to continue going there.
Years ago National Geographic portrayed how we see a flower and how a bee see the same flower. It was fascinating! Waiting for my tulips to open!
I love the idea of thinking about how another creature perceives the environment in which we find it. I’ll see if I can find that National Geographic article. My neighbor had a few more tulips bloom overnight–you should not have to wait for long.
Oh my gosh! Those are GORGEOUS captures!
(I really love white flowers, too. Just something so absolutely pure about them. They make me want to linger longer among them.)
Beautiful variations of the Lady Jane tulip, Mike. Like many readers, I prefer the first one.
The warm weather lately has been very becoming for our tulips now.