Reflections… May 31, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature.1 comment so far
…in a pond along the road to the Mary Lyon Homestead, where I get my drinking water from an ice cold spring:
Slim and I stopped to listen to the chorus of frogs as the evening light faded, and I took this twenty-second exposure during a lull in the nearly incessant breeze. I’m happy with the result, despite the slightly soft focus on the nearly imperceptibly moving fertile fronds of the cinnamon ferns in the foreground.
A Couple Of Quickies. May 31, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature.Tags: Bladder campion, scenic, sorrel, wildflowers
1 comment so far
Here are a couple of shots just to let you know I’m still alive.
A field along Route 2 in Charlemont, with the red seed-heads of sheep sorrel, a few buttercups, and some distant Bladder Campion:
Here’s a close-up of the Bladder Campion (Silene cucubalus ):
I’m up to my eyeballs in photos of Elder Progeny’s graduation last weekend, and will post those as soon as I’ve paired the mountain down to a size I can choose from. 🙂
Ruby Tuesday: The Carnivorous Edition. May 25, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature, Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: balls, buds, carnivorous, northern pitcher plants, pitchers
9 comments
The strangely dispassionate buds of the Northern Pitcher Plant, Sarracenia purpurea:
…and their accompanying pitchers, vascular* and dangerous:
Penile on the outside, vaginal on the inside, with balls:
Isn’t nature wonderful!
* So what’s with the vascular, already? That’s two vasculars in two weeks!!
A hearty thanks to Mary over at Work of thePoet for hosting this Ruby meme.
Dinner With TCR! May 25, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Dinner with TCR.Tags: avocados, cucumbers, salad, sprouts, sunflower seeds
4 comments
Tonight, a simple salad:
Built on sprouts and cucumbers, fortified with carots and avocados, garnished with black olives and sunflower seeds, dressed with an organic ranch.
‘Twas guuud!
Humble And Proud. May 22, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature.Tags: Ashfield, barns, Lanesboro
4 comments
Humble:
Proud:
A local barn:
…at a very rural golf course.
It’s a nice spot.
Rurality. May 22, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature.Tags: deerfield river, Heath, lilacs, morning, Mount Greylock, plainfield, pond, Spring
4 comments
Along the way, over the last couple of days.
Morning on the Deerfield River:
Playing with that effect; I’d like to get an eye for it, shoot specifically for this treatment, and see what comes of it.
But not all the time.
A pasture in Adams, overlooked by Mount Greylock:
A lilac stand at a field corner in Colrain:
A pond in Plainfield:
…and up in Heath, a roadside spring:
This part of the world changes mile by mile. It’s one of the many things I like about New England – the ability to move between environments without traveling all day.
More Spring Flowers. May 21, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature, macro photos.Tags: buttercups, fleabane, wildflowers
4 comments
Today’s catch – Buttercups and fleabane:
Buttercups (Ranunculus) …
…and…
…fleabane (Erigeron philidelphicus) …
Sorry. Flowers are easy, and I’m a bit rushed tonight. 😉
May Bounty! May 20, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Dinner with TCR.Tags: 100 yard diet, morels, stuffed rigatoni, white sauce
8 comments
In addition to the last of the fiddleheads and ramps, May brings us New Englanders our first fresh mushrooms.
And Boy, the opening act is gonna be hard to follow:
White morels. I’ve had good years with these, and years without any. So any is good, and many is amazing!
Here are a few which are doomed, DOOMED I say…
…to be sauteed in butter and white wine, then simmered in a garlic and cream sauce with a few drops of white truffle oil:
…and served over fresh ricotta-stuffed rigatoni:
with a modest organic side salad.
Spring is good to us Roadside Grazers!
Ruby Tuesday: The Original Ruby Slippers. May 18, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature, Love and Death, macro photos.Tags: A wild New England orchid, the Lady's Slipper
17 comments
Before Judy Garland,
Before Dorothy,
Before L. Frank Baum,
There were Ruby Slippers:
And Oh, those Lady’s slippers! Lush and full, vascular and inviting,
Queen of the Woodland Blooms, sensual and elegant,
Irresistible to her pollenators, who enter through her frontal folds but are forced by her form to exit through the opening in her top
…taking a parcel of pollen with them.
Form follows function,
function follows form.
It’s genius, I tell you!
Thanks to Mary at Work of the Poet for this Rubesque meme!
With And Without. May 18, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Uncategorized.Tags: cemetery, evening light, washes
7 comments
Here’s a shot I took at the end of the day, when the light was just skipping across the surface of things. There were these odd, bud-like wildflowers rising on elegant stalks in this cemetery up in the hills, and I had to pull over and try to get that image. Sorry to not know the mame of the wildflower (though “weed” would be widely accepted for such an unknown species.) I’ll look it up.
Anyway, the photo did indeed capture the drama inherent in the light:
and I dug it.
But I’ve lately been playing with my images a bit, and in particular, I’ve been sadisticly enjoying stripping them of a goodly amount of their colour, rendering them “washed;” not black and white, but drained of their messy reality and rendered as ghost/surrogate images, with a different feel and intent:
I like this effect; it seems to pare things down to their skeletal forms without losing all attachment to reality.
Let me know if I overdo it with this technique – I’m trying to keep it to situations where it’s actually a value-added thing rather than just another way to look at a photo.
Little Bang Theory 