Rubbish in a new light

Out walking, on a block cleared for building, there was some dumped rubbish.  One item was a crushed wing mirror from a car.  The sun was reflecting off it, so I switched my camera to macro auto focus setting (1 area) and set it down next to the pieces.  Aperture Priority f/2.8, 100 ISO, white balance on daylight, and I had this interesting shot that looks like a blue glass mountain.

A walk looking for macros

Once I had decided I wanted to do lots more with macros, I picked up my camera and headed out - but first I took a close up of my Mother's Day flowers, chrysanthemums, my favourite flower.

©Christine LintonThis one I took with an F/8 aperture which is the largest aperture I have.  I wanted to get focus over the whole bunch of flowers.

Then I went over to Lochiel Park where I noticed some yellow fungi (mushrooms or toadstools, I don't know which, nor did I touch because I don't know what is poisonous) growing in the approach borders.  Used an aperture of F/2.8 for these, so that I could get a good quality close up.  I also used the Macro setting as I had the camera within a few centimetres of them.

©Christine Linton
F/2.8

I find weeds as fascinating as cultivated flowers, often more so.  They don't have that perfect look, often a bit shaggy and half-eaten, but still showing a strong presence.  I admire their stand against perfection.  Such as this weed, I think a dandelion head shedding it's clock.  This one I also took on the macro setting and with a F/2.8 aperture.

©Christine Linton
F/2.8

Rob Sheppard talks about photographing unexpected things such as weeds on his blog.

Macros

I have posted a new page on this blog, called Macros - because, well, I'm particularly interested in developing my macro skills.  I've put a few pix on there to start off and will put more on as I take them.

A spider in the ginger lily

I found this spider in the ginger lily and took a close up shot of it.

spider in the ginger lily - web trapped leaf fragment

©Christine Linton

Technical details: Aperture Priority, f/2.8, ISO 100, which gave a shutter speed of 1/320 second.  I used "Vivid" photo style; daylight white balance.  AF 1 area.