I like freezing motion as much as long exposures of things that stay still. Today I played around with water splashes. None of them came out exceptionally clear since it’s hard to judge exactly where the splash is going to be. But this is one of the better images. My son likes it because when looked at far away it resembles a mitten and he thought that was cool.
A few weeks ago I discovered a Killdeer Plover nest along the route I walk in my neighborhood. Each day I would walk past and the parents of the eggs would run out to meet me and try to distract me away from the nest. They seemed extra anxious this week and I guess it’s because the eggs were hatching.
Over the course of four or five days the eggs kept disappearing. Finally, one morning I went past and there were only two eggs left. They were disappearing so quickly I assumed they were being eaten by something. This made sense because the nest was on the ground a few inches from the sidewalk. A dog or any other animal could have had a quick bite to eat on their way by.
I took a second walk that day and this time there was only one egg left! I came closer and noticed a little chick where one of the eggs had been that morning. The adult birds were very upset that I was taking such an interest in their family. They were squaking their heads off and running at me like they wanted to peck my face off.
I went back home to grab my camera. When I got there I researched plover hatching and discovered they hatch and walk away from the nest on the same day. I hustled back there, took a few photos and went on with my day. Sure enough, later in the afternoon I went by again and the chick was gone. Today all the eggs were gone.
I have to water my lawn with city water instead of irrigation. So I hate to see it run off, flow down the street and go down the drain. But at least in this case I was able to take advantage of it to get this cool picture.
For a while now I’ve been wanting to make a pencil holder or a pencil box out of pencils. Of course regular pencils are a little boring so I decided to go with colored pencils. I’ll write up a post in the future about how to make them. For now I’ll just show you the finished tube.
For today’s photo I went outside at night and hunted out shadows made by the streetlight on my corner. I’m sure my neighbors thought I was insane for standing outside on my lawn with a tripod and camera in the dark. But what do they know? I liked this image because it looks like some sort of tree monster stalking someone.
I’ve been slowly building my container garden in the back yard. One plant I really enjoy is Celosia. It’s feathery spires come in several different colors. I have pink orange and red. The orange are brilliant and deep in color but I chose the pink because it’s a unique color to my garden and my picture of it was sharper than my pictures of the orange ones. I’ve been taking a lot of flower, garden and nature pictures lately due to all of the spring blooms. Hopefully I can keep some color throughout much of the summer. But it will start getting harder as the temperature starts getting hotter.
I thought I would take a crack at long exposure photography for day ten of my photo-a-day challenge. This bottle of Avocado oil takes on a magical look with wisps of light trails surrounding it. The light source for the entire image was a single mini light from the dollar store.
I was struggling with a subject for day 8. I was running around all day and didn’t have any time to even think about photography. When I finally made it home I walked in and saw my son’s lego creation sitting on the counter. He let me take it outside and get this shot. The sun was low on the horizon and gave some great backlight. I love how it comes through the opaque pieces.
My photo a day for 30 days challenge is almost a quarter of the way over already! It’s already been a lot of fun but I definitely find it a challenge some days. I’m used to taking pictures when I get inspired by a scene or have a theme in mind. But this is forcing me to actually think about subjects that aren’t immediately obvious.
Picking up the camera every day and telling yourself that you have to find something interesting to photograph makes you much more aware of your surroundings. It makes you observe the things you pass by without thinking about on a regular basis. It helps you reimagine objects based on their shape and color rather than just their utility.
Today’s photo is of an old Briggs and Stratton engine sitting on a lawn edger. I liked the color of it as well as the lines made by the cooling fins. Click here to see all of the posts in this challenge.
