AWE Gallery: Stacy Boorn

We have had lots of rain in the Bay Area which you would think produced a plentiful wildflower bloom.  It seems the invasive grasses respond profusely to the rains.  But you can still find among them plentiful colors and the California golden icon – the POPPY.  The California Poppy is solid orange and the Coastal Poppy is a two tone – yellow and orange flower.  (and my favorite).  Blossom by Blossom we bloom again and again.

Although we don’t have carpets of poppies like you find in the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve, but you can find wonderful patches on the hillsides, sand dunes and highways providing ample samples of beauty.  Abbott’s Lagoon and Kehoe Beach in Point Reyes National Seashore are good locations for the Coastal Poppy and Mt. Diablo for the California Poppy.

California Native Americans cherished the poppy as both a source of food and for oil extracted from the plant. “Its botanical name, Eschsholtzia californica, was given by Adelbert Von Chamisso, a naturalist and member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences, who dropped anchor in San Francisco in 1816 in a bay surrounded by hills of the golden flowers. Also sometimes known as the flame flower, la amapola, and copa de oro (cup of gold), the poppy grows wild throughout California. It became the state flower in 1903. Every year April 6 is California Poppy Day, and Governor Wilson proclaimed May 13-18, 1996, Poppy Week.”

Please be sure to see my “Poppy” portfolio.

Because I was off to visit my dad in Schenectady, New York, I didn’t have much time to be out and about with my camera.  But just yesterday morning I saw a wonderful pattern in my kitchen.  The morning sun was shining and coming through a plastic cup on the sink’s edge.  I was attracted to the pattern that was cast as the light came through the glass.

Adding a blue piece of construction paper beneath the cup created the feeling of “waves.”  These little details create wonderful abstracts.  “It is astonishing how short a time it takes for very wonderful things to happen.” – Francis Burnett

There is so much color in Golden Gate Park right now that I don’t have to go very far to fill my frame.  The Japanese Tea garden is especially pretty as the cherry blossoms are coming into full bloom. The Tea Garden was originally developed in 1854 as a Japanese Village for the California Midwinter International Exposition. You can wend your way through the bridges, pools, and statuary and take in the lush plantings of trees and flowers before stopping in the tea house for refreshment.

I didn’t make it that far, because I found wonderful blossoms outside.  This one was early morning, still wet from fog which had cleared to revel some very beautiful blue skies.  I used the on camera flash with a diffuser over it.  I took my meter reading first at aperture priority f/22 and the camera told me I needed a shutter speed of 1/8 of a second.  So I set these in the manual setting and added fill flash.

Although many of the cherry blossoms are pink or at least pink around the edges and the buds, I liked the almost completely white of this grouping as well as its almost s-shaped cluster.  Also I wanted to show part of the branch and trunk to keep it in context.

The end of March and early April the Red Winged Black Birds in the Marin headlands begin their couting rituals.  Their songs and beautiful colorations signal spring and the joyousness of the season.  I don’t know why, but their songs remind me of the music of Hidegard von Bingen – one of the most remarkable women of the Middle Ages – visionary, mystic, composer, naturalist….

The scrubs and the reeds of the marshes are the red winged black bird’s “monastery” where they present their own experiences of the Holy Other.  They are very common and tend to be over looked by photographers.  But do join them in their cattail dominion!

There was so much rain and wind this week that I didn’t think I would have a single shot to share.  But on Friday morning before my first appointment I had about and hour and a half to walk among the redwoods, rhododendrons, Calla lilies, dew dripping grassed, and  Magnolia trees.  This beauty is located in the National AIDS Memorial Grove (NAMG) in Golden Gate Park.

This memorial was conceived in 1988 by a small group of San Franciscans living in a community devastated by the AIDS epidemic.  Now a peaceful garden and devotional pathways provide much comfort from nature and the growing circle of names.  Information about the grove can be found at:  http://www.aidsmemorial.org/

People come here for memorials and remembering and find a sacred place to grieve and heal.  Photographing the circle of names, I think, is a way of helping us and the world to not forget – not forget the thousands, millions, of people from around the globe that have died and those who are living with HIV and AIDS.

It seemed also an appropriate place to take a moment for silence and reflection after the loss of lives and homes these past two weeks in Japan, Libya and other places of devastation and conflict.

The rain water on the circle of names gave the stone a vibrant color.  The fallen Chinese Maple leaves provided a point of focus and seemed connected to the very names they were touching.  I shot the circle of names from many angles and chose this simple section as my favorite.  It was an overcast day so I didn’t have to worry about unwanted shadows or glare off the stone.  New names are added yearly for World AIDS day.

I used a Canon Digital 18-200 mm lens.  You can lock it at 18 mm.  I thought you could zoom it out and look it at any length – something that would be helpful when shooting straight down.  Unfortunately this is not the case and I had to hold the lens at the mm I needed for this image to keep it from slipping to 200 mm.

After working this area a while I was next attracted to some near by Calla Lilies (will there be any left for Easter which comes very late this year?) Getting in close I noticed a white spider on one of the flowers.   It is a “Goldenrod Spider” and on yellow flowers it is usually yellow and turns white on white flowers. To keep the light pretty even and shoot at 1/200 of a second to keep the slight motion of the lily petal and spider from blurring I used a ring light on a 100 mm macro lens.  This is pretty much a 1:1 image.  The depth of field is so shallow at this ratio – so it is good to be able to shoot at f/22 (thanks to the flash).  I opened the exposure up by one stop – since the light meter was reading the light on white!

If you are in the Bay Area please visit A Woman’s Eye Gallery, adjacent to the purple church, at 678 Portola Dr.  www.awegallery.com and see our exhibits.  I have just added some images from Hawaii.  AND right now the many of the cherry trees are blooming in Golden Gate Park.

There has been a lot of rain in the Bay Area the last week.  I am hoping that will help the wildflowers which are beginning in their regular locations, although it has been rather cold.  I must admit that I am willing to use a spray bottle to add water drops to the petals of the flowers.  But there is nothing quite like the round drops of  actual dew, rain and fog.

The Spanish Broom along the Fairfax-Bolinas Road coming down from Mount  Tamalpias in Marin Country was laden with rain drops most of the week. There aren’t too many places to pull over and park, but when you can you will be able to fill your fame easily with dynamic images as you walk along the road.

In addition to the broom, milk maids, star lilies, bushes, grass, lush green and a few Douglas Iris the spider webs were also weighed down with dew drops.  These are very challenging because the slightest breeze makes them seem like they are performing the Nut Cracker Ballet with all that bouncing around. When you get very close I also like the way the orbs on the web look like planets set in some undiscovered universe.

I used a 100 mm macro lens with a 20mm extension tube to get in close to the drops.  When you run the focus you can see that the Spanish Broom Bushes behind the spider web is reflected (up side down) in each dew drop.  I needed a fairly shallow depth of field to be able to both prevent blur from the slight breeze and to keep the background out of focus.  The comprise I needed to make was to not be able to hold the focus in all the water drops on the web.  You would have very narrow depth of field this close even at f/32.

The over cast and drizzly day provided wonderful light for this subject.  I shot this image at 1/80 of a second,  f 4.5 at ISO 400.  I changed angles ever so slightly to change the back ground colors.  I liked this one the best that gave me a yellowish color created by the out of focus broom blossoms and the stone hillside behind them.  A busy background would not work with this shot.  Background is almost as important as the subject since it can make or break an image.

Later in the week I was still thinking of those wonderful water drops and sought other “circle” shapes.  The second shot is a close up of a beaded box.  I used the shallowest depth of field possible with my macro lens – f 2.8.  This kept less than one row of the beads and the connecting wire in focus and as you went out from this row they became more and more out of focus.

I used a ring light flash, 2 stops under exposed, to get enough light on the subject and produce the circle of light at the top and the bottom – which is just the shape of the aperture.  I like the combination of colors and the diagonals that the beaded rows provided.  Often an out of focus foreground doesn’t work – not so here!

Vibrant COLOR is a main theme for the way I see and capture images.  After using Velvia slide film for so many years I began to “see” like that film.  I continue to seek and pair color and contrast in my work.

In this “Touch of Tulip” the use of “selective focus” creates an abstract extraction of stamen and petal. Last week I presented an image of an entire tulip. This week I concentrated on pieces of the tulips.  Using a 100 mm macro lens I choose a one to one subject.  That is, the subject exactly the same size as my sensor.  It is fun to practice finding this size image by setting your macro lens to it’s 1:1 setting – or it’s closest focus, and then moving in to your subject until it comes into focus.  (or the specific part of the subject).  Not all close up lenses are 1:1 macros.

You can achieve a close focus by placing extension tubes between your lens and camera.  They don’t have any glass and do not magnify your image – just puts your lens a little closer to your subject.

Take advantage of the least amount depth of field by opening up your aperture as much as possible.  My 100 mm’s  largest aperture (wide open) is 2.8.  As you can see only a tiny sliver of the tulip is in focus.  Yellow, Orange and a deep-purple – almost velvet black are the only colors.  Less is more.    I don’t need to know that this is even a tulip to experience its soul!

Photography is painting with light… so paint away!

Color also pops when early morning light illuminates a subject.  Although I found these boats and the Golden Gate Bride a busy subject the brilliant color from the reflection to the top of the bridge holds my interest.  Get up and out early in the morning.  Thanks to day light savings that is not as early for the next couple of weeks.

This small yacht club is in Marin, the North side of the Golden Gate Bridge near the  Coast Guard Station and the Discovery Museum.  It is a lovely area to often see the bridge reflected.  You approach from the East Road on your way into Sausalito – if you are not familiar with the area.

Although insolating the reflections in the water might make for a stronger picture I can’t resist including the bridge.  This is the north tower and the best sun light is now hitting it between 7:30 – 9:00 AM.  You will even find a few harbor seals and western grebes and a couple of Canadian Geese here.

If the sun is not directly behind you remember to use your polarizer – it also helps poop the colors!

Mid February to early March tulip mania comes to Pier 39 to greet the tourists during  President’s Day week with a bonanza of colors.  The best time to capture images of the tulips in the beds and barrels is at sunrise when it is likely to be less windy.  They often have water drops on them from the rain, fog or sprinkler system.

I especially enjoy using a 400 mm lens with selective focus so that the background area is narrow and can be easily thrown out of focus to give you just the hint of the background tulips as revealed in the colors.  At f/5.6 without any tulips close the main subject I was able to get enough focus on the one tulip and throw the background out of focus so it is not competing with the subject.  Don’t forget to use your tripod and remote.  Also use your mirror lock-up to avoid the he vibration of the shutters.

I moved around until I found red colors at the bottom and green at the top to mimic the opposites of the tulip which has a green steam at the bottom and some red in the flower toward the top of the image.  The water drops also help you focus on your subject, since it is easier to tell if they are in focus then the edges of the flower itself.  The sun can often be garish on flowers but this was just at sunrise so the low angle of the sun nicely lit this tulip.

Later in the month the tulips should be abundantly blooming at the Mountain View Cemetery in Oakland.  Cemeteries are often wonderful places to photograph mushrooms, wild flowers and seasonal planting.  And if you get bored with that you can scope out interesting tombstones as an additional subject.

The second image from this week is from Nicasio Reservoir in Marin on the Lucas Valley Road.  Early in the  morning the water is often very still and mirror like.  I used a very simple and old version of ArcSoft Panorama software to stitch these 7 images together.  The Green grass on the hills in the middle section scream – the winter rains are here.

Obviously getting out at dawn and sunrise is a must!

In the winter months at the mouth of the Russian River near Jenner, CA on the Sonoma Coast the harbor seals gather.  You need to keep your distance, especially when they begin to pup in March.  But in January and February with a 400 mm lens you are able to get off some really nice shots.

Harbor seals spend their entire lives along the same stretch of coastline. They spend many hours during low tide hauled out on a favorite sandbar, beach or rocky island soaking in the warm sunshine. You need to keep your distance because harbor seals are the most vulnerable when out of the water and will quickly swim off if you get too close.

Sitting and waiting for them to put their heads up now and again is helpful when doing a single seal or a portrait.  These two seals put their head up and looked in my direction because others were approaching on the beach.  If the seals are watching you from their haul-out area, you’re too close.

In the massive group it isn’t too bad to have them all sacked out.  This particular morning the seagulls were out in force because of something they were feeding on in the river water as it meet the ocean (or visa versa – I am not quite sure).  You can keep going back to your same locations because the harbor seal haul out in the same place year after year.

I choose these two shots from the same day this past week because of the use of a rather wide angle (28 mm) and a long lens.  Winter sun is still pretty low in the sky at 9 AM.  So the whole scene wasn’t washed out.  I used a polarizing filter to keep the glare off the seals and hold the color in the blue sky.  Of course I needed to find an angle that put me at least at a 60 degree angle from the sun.

OTHER locations to see harbor seals include: Lake Earl Wildlife Area, Patrick’s Point State Park, MacKerricher State Park, Sonoma State Beach, San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge, San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge, Elkhorn Slough Ecological Reserve, Montana de Oro State Park, Carpenteria State Beach, Crystal Cove State Park.

It has been very rainy here this past week so I must admit I was a “fair weather photographer.”  There is even the unusual snow dusting on the hills around the bay area.  Although, “get up and get out there” is one of my photographic mantras, I did not follow my own advice.

So Golden Gate Park’s Conservatory of Flowers, where the low land tropics are at 80 degrees, was my chosen destination.  There are some wonderful orchids blooming.  You cannot use your tripod here so a ring light flash was my choice to obtain the desired light for capturing the beauty of the orchid’s delicate details.  I find the orchid centers to be most sensual.   I purposefully choose to have one section where the petals part to add drama to the composition.  Although I prefer to carry an  arsenal of lenses for a DSLR (Canon) I am amazed what you can do with a small $200 Nixon CoolPix when it comes to close up images.

My second shot is some moss growing on the end of a log.  Although it was bright sunlight I felt it worked for this image because the deep rotted out portions of the end of the log were in shadow causing those areas to be solid black.  I also tried it in defused light but chose this one.

Although it is winter the greening of the hills and the blooming of the first wild flowers makes it feel like “spring.”  Tomorrow our seasonal rains are supposed to return.  So this past week I took advantage of the sunshine.  Already the wild mustard is growing in many of the vineyards in Sonoma and Napa Wine Country.  Finding a section of vineyard that allows the vines to take you into the distant hills provides a beautiful image.  Adding an edge of road with water helped enhance this image.

So I mounted my camera on my tripod and used a 28 mm lens with a polarizing filter to eliminate the glare on the grass and pump up the blue in the sky.  This works best if the sun is at a 45-90 degrees angle from your lens (so you don’t want the sun behind you).  So getting to this vineyard before 8:30 AM was helpful.  My aperture was f/22 to give me as much depth of field as possible (that is a focus from foreground to background).

This week ended up being about “water.”  Although I did not get beautiful clouds in the sky at sunrise, I was able to take advantage of a small cloud that bounced the dawn light onto the bay water that was gently moving with the ebb tide.  The effect was as if there was neon like lines and circles in the water.  This is captured as I saw it.

Often when there are insignificant clouds at the horizon at sunrise you can look west to see what the first light will illumine with its golden rays.  This intense quality of light will last 15-30 minutes.  Or look into the water itself to see what light is picked up from the clouds as I did with this shot.  I needed a fast enough shutter speed to slightly freeze the movement of the water. Otherwise the colors would have just been a blur with no distinct lines.

I needed to use a 400 mm lens to reach the area in the water where the light was best reflecting.  In order to get a fast enough shutter speed at ISO 400 I had to give up some depth of field so some of the lines are soft from.  But I still like the abstract that I was able to extract.

This past week I had the opportunity to see the beginning of the lush blooming mustard in the vineyards of Sonoma.  But the images I chose to share with you are from an in house set-up.  The photography group I belong to in San Francisco had a theme night.  Members of Photochrome were challenged to create images that fit this category – “Food and kitchen Stuff.”

Some folks comb through their arsenal of images to find something that fits the theme and other shoot specifically for the assignment .I often don’t participate in these assignments because I rather be outside seeking patterns in nature, migratory birds and vast seascapes on my day off.  see www.photochrome.org

But this is my attempt at “Food and Kitchen Goods.”  Both shots are of Macaroni in the shape of hearts placed on a spoon strainer under running water.  What I had in mind was to show one image with the water streaks become a silky splash over the macaroni and other shot with water drops frozen as they splashed off the macaroni.

For the first shot I used indirect natural light coming in the kitchen window and a little over head tungsten light.  This accounts for the yellowish tint which was my intent.  The spoon of macaroni is over a stainless steel sink. That color background for this shoot just wasn’t working.  So I put some brown paper towels in the sink.  With my camera mounted on a tripod I used a 1.5 second shutter speed.  I like this method for water falls, like the image I shared the fist week of January.

I arranged the macaroni until I got a composition that I liked.  The lighting provided a warm feel to the image.

Then I turned my attention on capturing the image in such a way that some of the water drops would be frozen.  For this I added a flash.  I set the aperture and shutter speed as in the first shot in order to capture a little bit of water flow and then add fill flash to freeze some of the water drops splashing off the macaroni and spilling out of the faucet.

In the second shot I also wanted a “cool” feel to it so I removed the paper towels from the sink and let the stainless steel color take on a blue cast as seen just below the spoon and through it’s holes.  Also I added a little more depth of field so that the range of the water drops would be covered.  Shot at f/16 at 1.5 seconds.  You can still see the flowing water – more like a halo.  The flash catches some of the water drops and the open shutter speed continues to capture the stream.

Wouldn’t it be fun to photograph something every day?  I know I can’t get to it, so a couple times a week with some intentionality is a good compromise.