Another Moment in the Garden

A Dash of Purple

Yellow and Green

How to Brighten a Cloudy Day

It’s amazing how a splash of color can make a dreary day better.

Colors in Bloom

Time at the lake meant finding lotus blossoms and a trip to the local rose garden…well, roses.

Wondering Where Spring Is

Spring is avoiding northern Minnesota and so I need to find other ways to keep me believing it will arrive one day. This is an image from one of my house plants.

Time in the Garden

Early morning in a summer garden to capture the last iris before it fades, plus a poppy and a Peony.

Be Still My Bleeding Heart

One of the joys of spring is what blooms in the garden…

Focus Stacking

As time permits, I am continuing to learn more about focus stacking.  Since spring is doing it’s best to finally make an appearance in northern Minnesota, the garden is doing it’s best to respond.  A few small flowers have sprung up and it seemed a good opportunity to try capturing two small clumps of blooms.

The first group is a stack of 22 images, the second was 19.  If you look closely on the first, you will notice the tip of one leaf in the foreground where I missed focus.  I missed several on the second.  I’m excited by the possibilities of using focus stacking and look forward to applying it in other ways.

My set-up: Canon DSLR, Canon 100mm 2.8 Macro, ASUS Android tablet running DSLR Controller (works with most Canon DSLRs).  I export images from Lightroom as Photoshop layers, then use the Auto-Align if needed and Auto-Blend for combining the stack.  There are many videos on You-Tube that describe the technique.

A Few Minutes In The Garden

Due to other work and a rebuilding project at home, I haven’t been able to get to far from home lately.  But I was able to spend a few minutes enjoying the flowers in the garden.