Nature Meets City

Nature Meets City, originally uploaded by senecacreekphotography.

A year ago if you had asked me if I wanted to go take pictures of the downtown of a city I would have told you we should get together to go hiking instead. Typically in my pictures I tend to leave out just about any traces of man-made objects, especially people… if there was a street sign, i would crop it out so you could just see the leaves of the trees and could get the sense that you were in some remote back country, instead of some sidewalk.

This year i have had some “city dwelling” people force me out my forests and into downtown Philadelphia to take pictures. At first, I did not really find any subjects that interested me, but this picture if one of my first transitions to including cities in my photos. Typically, i would have experimented with every possible angle to try to crop this building out of the picture, but after spending a fair amount of downtown Detroit, I may finally be accepting the fact that i live in a concrete wonderland, and think that buildings may be just what i need to expand my photographic horizon and open my mind to not only the beauty of the natural world, but of our humanly creations as well.

Now I am including some urban landscape photography (in addition to natural landscapes) in my typical online musings and stumbled upon this basic article about urban landscapes.

Serene Reflection

Serene Reflection, originally uploaded by senecacreekphotography.

This was taken at Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania. While waiting around for the fountain show I decided that I would wander through the water gardens again just to kill some time after already taking pictures there…. I happed to be at the right place at the right time just as the sun was setting, the conservatory reflected perfectly in the water.

Sometimes a good photograph is really a matter of a photographers patience and persistence. Revisit places at different times of day even if you think you got a great shot already, each hour of the day yields a completely different light and mood!

Roadside Day lily

Roadside Daylily, originally uploaded by senecacreekphotography.

I seem to find the most day lilies just along the side of the road. They are beautiful for about two weeks but soon die and flop over due to the massive weight of how tall they are. I found this bunch on the corner of two roads and had some real problems getting to them without getting hit! With the right cropping and focusing selections, you can easily make a street picture appear to be tranquil and removed.

Nature is all around us.. you do not need to go to a big National Park to get some beautiful shots, you just need to learn to have a good eye to pick up the small details of the wilderness right in your backyard, or in this case, the street! The small depth of field hides the fact that they gray in the background is not some natural formation in some hidden and removed nature area, but in fact the road That disciplined eye or that awareness and capability to find natural beauty anywhere is really what i find my nature photography to be about, and is what i strive for as my personal goal.

Day Bloomer

Purple Tropical Waterlily, originally uploaded by senecacreekphotography.

Another troipical lily from Longwood Gardens, PA. Except unlike the previous post, this one only blooms during the day.

Night Bloomer

Night Bloomer, originally uploaded by senecacreekphotography.

On a long trip to Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania (which i highly suggest visiting!) we went outside to the water gardens to find theses lilies. They are tropical and only bloom at night.

My flash was too strong and washed out the colors yet it was too dark to be clear. Another photographer was using some piece of paper over his flash so i asked. He uses a type of thick tracing paper that you can get an any craft store. By folding it enough times so that i got the right lighting i saved myself a lot of money on a fancy diffuser!