Recent Images in B&W

Since we are now going through a rainy spell, I've gone back to some of the recent flower images and tried my hand at B&W conversion for them. I hope you enjoy these.



Tulips seems to lend themselves to this treatment. The subtle variation in colors and the texture of the petals make this a nice way to render these images.

Isn't that the way with everything...subtle shades of gray and complex textures? With nearly 200 countries in the world, each claiming a different culture even if only subtly different from their neighbors, we live on a planet with little black and white but lots of gradations in between. This is what I find fascinating about traveling to house and pet sit. The small shifts in cultural texture as we move from one state to another in Australia; how colors dominate the feel of San Miguel De Allende, Mexico; the way London feel alive to me but Paris is just a museum. all this must tell you something about the people that live there. So it must be with the flowers that grow in a region. After all, isn't nature where we learned our culture and texture?

These early blooms on a tulip tree remind me a little of the translucent skin of a elderly person showing veins and the wear of years. Sometimes looking at monochrome images of flowers is a bit of window into my future. If I live that long.

The camillia on the corner near our house has been the subject of several photos you've seen here, even in monochrome. But I never tire of seeing this delicate flower so here it is again.

This view gives her (aren't all flowers female at some level?) the look of someone (or something, if you prefer) with a secret. Parts of the petals are brightly lit and easy to inspect. Other parts are more or less in the shade and, in varying degrees, hidden from full view. It feel as if I've taken a photo of a relationship. Much to see, yet much still to discover.

I find that monochrome often strips away the distractions of real life and allows one to see things in a new way. The beads of water standing on this Lamb's Ear is case in point. The shiny water and fuzzy matte leaves make a good contrast that is accentuated by the shallow depth of field. there only one small place in the image that is focus and that is where the water stands.

Funny how life is often like that. The one part of the world we can see clearly is filled with interesting things. Imagine how marvelous it would be if we could see more of the world in focus at once. So many interesting bits in the world to discover.

Another tulip, this time giving its sexy parts an air bath. Probably not something we should try to emulate in the rest of lives, eh? Wonder if Robert Maplethorpe thought if flowers this way.

Well, at least not in public.