a rose by any other name…
This pretty little bud made its debut in my mom’s garden this past summer. It just looked so lovely after a sunshower that I simply couldn’t resist taking a few snapshots! Aren’t rainy roses just wonderful?
Sorry for the few and far between posts! Med school is a bit demanding right now, especially with my boards just a few months away, so keep checking back for a new post!
As usual, taken with the Canon Powershot G7. Post-processed for contrast in Photoshop CS3. Enjoy!
For Grammy, 11/10/1918 – 2/12/2010. You are loved and missed.
busy as a bee…
I’ve been as busy as this little bee lately…hence the severe lack of new posts in the past couple of weeks!! I’m in between my first and second years of medical school (read: last summer EVER) and I have the most amazing job honing my clinical skills in the Temple ER! That said, I’m pulling insane hours at the hospital/preparing my body for the sleep-deprived years to come and simply haven’t had the time to really sit down with my photos and put together a decent post. So, for all of you anxiously awaiting a post, I apologize for the delay and present you with…A BEE!
I snapped this little bugger on my brother’s porch over the Memorial Day weekend. A wee bit of cropping was done, as it is pretty darn hard to properly compose a shot when your subject is a centimeter long and constantly moving. A little bit of contrast fixing was also done, as yellow flowers + yellow bee stripes + super sunny day = totally washed out color/contrast levels.
Oh, yeah, I almost forgot…this was taken with the fabulous Canon G7!!
divine dahlia: part three…
All good things must come to an end…including the Divine Dahlia mini-series! 
Hope you have been enjoying the photos! Now, I know that this flower was beautiful in all of its colored glory, but I really wanted to try some good ol’ black-and-white to bring out the details in the petals…and I think it worked!
As usual, the photo was taken with the Canon G7. Post-processed in Photoshop to select the color of the black-and-white filter. Enjoy and stay tuned for more pictures!
divine dahlia: part two…
Part two in the mini-series!! Again, taken with the Canon G7. This photo had its contrast fixed a tiny bit in Photoshop. Enjoy one of the bloomin’ beauties of spring!
divine dahlia: part one…
Ok. I’m in love with this flower. It is one of the gorgeous dahlia plants that my mother has at home…and it was so beautifully colored and flawless that I simply couldn’t resist making it the star of its very own photo shoot. This photo is number one of a 3 photograph mini-series.
As usual, the amazing Canon Powershot G7 was used. I think it was definitely more fortuitous than planned that the detail in this bloom showed up so well…who knew dahlias have tiny hair-like things on their petals (look at the center petals up close). And, I’m happy to announce that the sunlight was so perfect that absolutely nothing was “fixed” on this photo…straight from the memory card! Yay!
sakura!!!
It is that wonderful cherry blossom (sakura in Japanese) time of year! This little gem was growing, of all places, on a lovely little tree in East Falls underneath the Roosevelt Expressway! I used my shutterbug syndrome enabler, the G7, to snap the flower. Post-processing was done to transform the photo into HDR-style and to bring out the details in the petals!
just add flower and water…
So I went out to my car this morning to start the daily commute to good ol’ med school and it just so happened to be pretty much the one day that I had my camera with me, as I wanted to take some pics of our acapella group (shout out to the Transplantations!!). And, as luck would have it, my windshield presented me with the perfect subject to shoot in the morning light! So, I quickly chose to get on the road a bit late in favor of a bit o’ photography. Thus came this shot. The flower is actually the underside of some flower that had fallen off of a tree and drifted onto my car. The water was courtesy of the veritable 10 minute monsoon that we had the night before. So, here’s the recipe for a photograph:
Add flower to water. Marinate overnight. Capture in the morning light.
steel…er…spring magnolias!
These gorgeous magnolias were in full bloom right in front of my apartment. Endless flowers that seemingly touch the sky–what a wonderful way to bring in spring. The image was taken with a Canon Powershot G7. The photo was then post-processed in Photoshop to fix the coloration and then transformed into a high-dynamic range image. Enjoy!
Pretty in Pink #3
This lovely pink zinnia was grown by the green thumb of my brother. I have to say that I love the contrast between the pink flower and the blue glass behind it The picture was taken with an Olympus Stylus 820 digital camera. Enjoy the third image in my “Pretty in Pink” series!
Pretty in Pink #2
These beautiful magnolias were captured on a lovely spring day using and Olympus Stylus 820 digital camera. Believe it or not, the white background for the flowers is indeed the sky…just the right combination of sunlight and angling the camera up at the magnolia tree, while using the sky as a background! One of those serendipitous right-place-right-time deals. The image was then processed using HDR software. Keep checking back for a small “Pretty in Pink” series that I am currently posting!
Pretty in Pink #1
This image was taken of a lovely pink flower in a bouquet that I bought to help chase the gray winter days away. A Canon Powershot G7 (new camera! yay!) on the macro setting. I would just like to comment on this camera: AMAZING!! Its nearly a full-fledged dSLR, but in a wonderfully compact size and with the ability to attach extra lenses. Its newer cousin, the G9 is currently available (this shoots in the RAW format), but I’m currently enjoying my little affair the G7 and don’t have eyes for any other camera 
Tulum, HDR style!
This is the HDR version of a previously posted picture (yay alliteration!). For more information regarding HDR, please read the immediately previous post. For the original image of the Tulum cliff-scape, just scroll down the page. It is important to note that this is pseudo-HDR, produced from the original 8-bit image. This is what causes the slight graininess that is most noticeable in the sky. However, it is an excellent example of how HDRi enhances colors and detail while suppressing shadows. Enjoy!
Photographer’s note: I will be visiting Mexico once more this summer, so stay tuned for more great Tulum and Playa del Carmen shots in mid-July!
Tulum, Mexico
This image was taken while “misbehaving” in Tulum, Mexico. There is a rope near the edge of the cliff so that happy-go-lucky tourists don’t accidentally walk off the edge, because dead tourists don’t bring in much revenue. Crawling under the rope and dangling a leg over the edge of the cliff so as to support myself (think tripod) on a rock below, I took this shot with a plain ol’ 35mm camera and 400ISO film. The negative was then digitally scanned and the colors balanced using Adobe Photoshop.
*Photographer’s note: Tulum is an absolutely amazingly beautiful place! I highly recommend that anyone visiting Mexico venture out to the site to view the ruins and breathtaking vistas.
Orchid
Some of you are probably wondering what the heck the image under my blog title is. Well, for those inquisitive souls, here you go. This is a close-up of an orchid. Taken with an Olympus Zoom D595Z digital camera and posted for your viewing pleasure.
Iris
This is a macro shot of an iris in my backyard spring garden. Taken with an Olympus Zoom D595Z digital camera.
