Capturing Character

You might have thought I was going to talk about the character of people. Rather, I am going to talk about capturing the character of flowers. Each flower seems to have a personality, a purpose. Some are soft and gentle, given to comfort. Others are dynamic and exciting, full of life!

This soft peach coloured carnation is a very gentle soul. Her tenderness is best captured with a shallow depth of field. She invites us to come close. Hard edges are blurred with the f/2.8 aperture and coming as close as my camera would allow.

And then we have this chrysanthemum. She is so full of movement and celebration! She calls me to step back a little more to take her all in, to watch as she dances in the light. Though I still used f/2.8 I did not shoot as close as I did for the gentle carnation.

I shot both of these images with my 60 mm macro lens at a speed of 1/60 and my ISO was 400.

Urban Shooting

Just an ordinary day on an ordinary street yet still so interesting to me. I am finding that although I love to take pictures of anything and everything, I am leaning more towards the urban shoot as being my favourite kind of shoot.

Composing the shot to capture the character of the scene, or what I interpret to be its character, is what I try to do. Bringing the image into Lightroom to bump up the contrast and intensify some of the colours enhances the old brick work and architecture we see here, further showing the scene's character.

Using f/6.3 and a shutter speed of 1/400 seemed adequate to capture enough detail for this composition.

Bicycle

I spent the morning with a good friend, wandering the streets and sidewalks of the Wolseley neighbourhood in Winnipeg. The character homes, quaint gardens, spindled fences, and cozy corners are almost too much to take in at once.

Of course, I had my camera with me and took a bunch of pictures. For this post I'll share my bicycle images with you. Known as an environmentally friendly area, peddle power (and walking) is a popular mode of transportation in this community, which adds to the neighbourhood's overall charm.

Both of these images are taken with my 60 mm prime lens. I love to take pictures of parts of things and allow the viewer to fill in the rest. This is easier for the viewer if the part I choose to capture is quickly identifiable.