fallen petals
picked an Easter bouquet of tulips from the garden
later, falling petals, almost as beautiful
remembering past withered petals, last tulips, and my most favourite tulipa, withering
You are browsing the Blog for Nature Archives - Page 6 of 29 - Marja-Leena Rathje.
by Marja-Leena by Marja-Leena seedheads & grass
The Kamloops area of BC is dry grassland country. When we visited late March, the predominant colour of the land seemed to be the shade of wheat and its many subtle variations. These plantings of silvery beige grasses interspersed with reddish dried stalks of echinacea caught my eye as we walked about the university campus. Such a contrast to the year-round colour of green in our southwest coastal rainforest.
by Marja-Leena back home
Recently we took a pleasant road trip up to visit our eldest daughter and her husband who live east of Kamloops. It is always a stunning drive along the Coquihalla Highway with its high mountain passes, still with lots of snow. It is hard to stop on the highway though I did take photos through the windows which I might show later though you may have seen some before. The first three above were taken at a rest stop where we ate our packed lunch. The last was taken in A & R’s yard the day after the light overnight snow was melting.
I was greatly struck by these as sort of archaeological or geologic images, not merely snow.
by Marja-Leena quiet
A picture is a poem without words. – Horace
You don’t take a photograph, you make it. – Ansel Adams
by Marja-Leena winter petals revisited
I enjoyed some further play with the faded and dry hydrangea flower head which I had photographed and posted previously. This time I used the scanner and dealt with two challenges: the shallow depth of field for a very three-dimensional object and the lack of lighting behind it, that is ‘above’ the flower head sitting on the scanner bed. Thus parts of the images are out of focus as well as missing those sharply delineated tracings in the petals that you saw in the previous photographs.
It was like working with different beasts of another dimension. Also for the third image, I shone a desk lamp down very close in the hopes of some backlighting but instead captured a bit of the movement of the scanner bar (or whatever it’s called) moving across, resulting in some interesting distortions in the background. In the end, I grew to like these a lot and now wonder how they would print, for they are a much higher resolution than the digicamera photographs.
by Marja-Leena winter petals
It’s been a gentle January, a few heavy rainstorms, a week of fog, and now sunshine to tempt me into the so green garden to check out new growth of green tips with white buds – those harbingers, the snowdrops. Yet I and the camera are drawn to the dry heads of hydrangea flowers.
I cut one head to bring indoors for some play with both camera and scanner. I wished to capture the light shining through from behind the petals.
I held up the flower in a window with sunshine streaming in. I love those fine lines creating intricate patterns!
Next time I will show the images that came forth from the scanner.
by Marja-Leena ice and reflections
a few of my favourite Christmas photos
at a special place on Vancouver Island, near Victoria on a little lake
with a thin layer of crackled ice on Christmas morning
at the home of middle daughter’s family where we all gathered for feasts, music, gifts
back home with eldest daughter and husband visiting here as well
now just the two of us catching up with photos, messages and a nap or two
on this fifth day of Christmas
reflections on this year’s winding down
thoughts of dear faraway family, friends and readers
hope all are having a pleasant holiday
as we are about to cross into a new year
by Marja-Leena snow day
snowing all night and this morning
nature dressing up for the winter solstice
lightness for the north’s longest night
December solstice falls about 3 am tomorrow, Saturday morning Pacific Standard Time according to this wonderful site. This snow may not last until then, so I’m celebrating early. Happy Solstice!
Another timely gift arrived for this occasion from a dear friend, Susan of phantsy that who wrote:
I found these pictures this morning. Knowing how much you enjoy examining the magical space between nature and technology, thought you might enjoy seeing them too.
Thank you, Susan, you do know how much I love frost flowers! Happy Solstice to you!