Trying To Stay Creative During The Lock Down; Part II

Camellia blossom (click to enlarge)
Olympus E-M1 Mark II; Olympus 60mm f/2.8 macro lens; 1/20th sec. @ f/8; ISO 1600

While locked down at home, I've been trying to keep busy.  Keeping busy all day, day after day after day after day, is certainly challenging.  One thing I'm doing is playing with indoor close-up, macro and still life photography with found objects.  I plan to post some of these over the remainder of the quarantine period.  Hope you enjoy them.

I have a number of camellia bushes in my back yard (garden).  I noticed some had  beautiful pink blossoms—some large and some small.  I found one that was perfect—no defects in any of the pedals, which is quite rare.  I cut it and brought it in to use as a macro subject to keep those creative juices flowing.  Secondarily, it made a nice addition to our home when placed in a small vase.

The set up was simple, basically the same one as I wrote about here.  I used my kitchen table as a surface.  I laid the blossom on a piece of good quality black velvet in case a little of the background would be visible in the final image.  The black velvet was draped over the back of two of my kitchen table chairs to give it some height.  The camera was mounted on an old Gitzo G0011 aluminum tabletop tripod with a small Manfrotto 3009 ball head attached.  I've written about it here and here.  The light is from two north facing kitchen windows directly behind me.  As I said, very simple.  You don't need to be elaborate to create an effective setup.

My original idea was to focus bracket and merge several images so the blossom would be sharp and crisp from front to back.  However, afterwards, that sharp, detailed image just didn't strike me as what I had envisioned.  It really wasn't the look I was after.  Rather than that, I decided to make an image that was more, I'll call it, "dreamy" in nature.  Not quite an abstract, but a bit ethereal.  The image posted here is the one I liked best.

From set up to take down, the entire process took less than thirty minutes.  Again, nothing has to be fancy or complicated.  Fancy and complicated will work against you as it will give you an excuse not to create.  Keep things simple to remove the creative obstacles.

What are you doing to keep your creative juices flowing during this trying time?  Let us know.

Join me over at my website, www.dennismook.com. 

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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