Lobelia Cardinalis - near Nannette's mailbox

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Lobelia Cardinalis (Cardinal Flower) is a plant I have growing by my mailbox.  It usually blooms in August and September.  I decided to take the left image from the top down as it had clusters at the top which is an unusual formation for this plant.  It is usually a single stem (right image) wit\h blossoms starting to bloom at the bottom and evetually bloom at the top.  It is a great plant for hummingbirds.  I had a difficult time getting a good background because this plant by a mailbox and near the curb/street. The right image I used the Old Confederate Rose leaves as a background  Images shot in Camera+.  Editing done in PSE 11.  In the right orignal image the beetles had "done a number" on the leaves with holes.  I did use the healing brush and clone tool to try eliminate them.

Pumpkin Lowcarb Cheesecake for Nannette's BD 9-28-2015

Yesterday was my birthday and instead if baking myself a BD cake, I made a pumpkin low carb cheesecake.  Usually I like to take this picture outside using natural light, but it has been raining for 4 days.  Rain does not mix with Cool Whip.  So, I took this image using the halogen overhead stove light.  It has some blown out areas to the right.  Used black shirt for a background.  The fork was shiny and there are some reflections in the handle which I could not remove in photoshop.  Used native iPhone 6 app, edited in PSE 11. That us a fresh :"knock out rose" bud.  I would like to retake this before the cheesecake gets eaten..

Ornamental Grasss "Poof" of the Fronds & Altered Image - Neighbor's Yard

This fall I have been trying to capture pictures of different grasses  Not an easy task when they seem to be blowing in the wind. This grass poofs out as it matures. This one was in my neighbor's yard.  I tried to capture some of the fronds as part of framing the single focus.  Too bad a cloudy day as it would have looked better with a Carolina blue sky.   Then, I decided to go with the altered art mode and do an invert filter of that image.. I did sharpen it to the max to get more texture.  Camera+  Edited in PSE 11

White Ginger Lily - Nannette's Yard

My white ornamental Ginger Lily just started to bloom  (9/24/15). I have been trying for days to get a good image but it has been raining for 3 days and windy.  So, I am going with the best capture I could get. I shot these with native camera   app for the iPhone 6. I did try to adjust exposure because of white blossoms.   The image on the left was edited normally in PSE 11. The image on the right I wanted to try for an altered art effect.  I  cropped to a more square image and used the lighten/darken sliders, sharpened to the max to show more texture in the petals and give a more painterly appearance.  I did not clone out the rain drops.  As a result of the super sharpening the grass in the foreground and background became more pixelated.  Too bad photography does not allow you to pass on the fragrance of these blossoms.

Jerusalem Artichoke Close Up - Nannette's Garden

I have some Jerusalem Artichokes (Helianthus tuberosa) growing in my garden.  This was a close up of a single blossom  taken on a rainy morning.  Some people consider it a weed, others a gourmet vegetable.  In France used in production of beer and wine.  It has a taste similar to a potato. This plant is a member of the sunflower family.  They bloom late summer and eveuntually you can harvest the root as a vegetable.  It can be pickled or roasted with seasonings and baked with other root vegetables.  Some restaurants list on their menu under side dishes as "chokes".or sunchokes not related to artichokes. These  plants can grow 7 ft tall. It is a rhizome/tuber and will come back again next year. Once you have them they multiply.  Camera+ HDR. Edited in PSE 11.

Burr Oak Dried Leaves with Shaggy Base Acorns - Haganstone Park, Pleasant Garden NC

Yesterday at our NC Unit Herb Society Meeting for Herb Study one of the gals brought a burr oak branch with a different kind of acorns and leaf structure.  She had found it on Sat. near a dump site where she was camping.   This burr oak is a member of the beech family and some cultivars can have leaves that are not lobed but look more like smaller beach leaves with the serrated edges.  I borrowed the branch from her so I could take a picture.  It had dried leaves and they were not portrait material.  I put  the branch on a black shirt background.and tried to arrange so you could see the leaves, the tops of the acorns with shaggy base and then 2 additional acorns I placed in the "nutcups" to see that view.   I did not use the original image and it was downsized.  Therefore, you can see some pixelization.  In post processing using PSE11 I had to do some major cloning of the leaves with insect bites or ???. I may have to go to Haganstone Park in Pleasant Garden to see if I can capture some other images with fresh leaves and acorns still adhered to the base. Did you know that at one time acorns were a souce of food for the American Indians and Pioneers?    

Osage Orange Cluster - Neighborhood

I have been watching this Osage orange for a few weeks. This tree is on my extended neighborhood walk.   I had previously posted a green fruit several weeks ago.  Now the fruit is becoming more yellow/orange.  I needed to wait for a cloudy day or the lighting ifrom the sun would have too many highlights.   Camera + HDR, Edited with PSE 11.

Autumn Maple Leaves - Backlit Rankin School

Today is the first day of fall.  Some of the leaves have a hint of color in Greensboro, NC, especially some maples.  It can be difficult to find them at iPhone level to get a close up.  One of my favorite things to do is to let the light shine from behind the leaves so you can better see the various colors of the leaves, plus the texture and the veins.  I stopped at an elementary school in my neighborhood. The Left image was taken about 4:30 PM EDST.  Camera+ HDR.  Edited in PSE 11.  Played with lighting, brightness, saturation and decreasing green in color variations. The Right image was cropped to a square and then posted on Instagram.  I had selected the "Hudson" filter.  I guess I like the Instragram one better because the red veins stand out more more texture. It was also a lot less work than  editing with sliders in PSE 11.

Pirate Booty Display at City Festival Park - Jamestown, NC 9/10/2015

Another image from my trip to Jamestown on Sat.and the Pirate Festival. Again mixed lighting an issue.  There was really more pirate booty but I chose this crop when taking the image.  This means you do not get to see the small skeleton that was in the right hand corner.  I shot the image with Camera+ HDR but did not use flash because I felt that would be too harsh and not sure how the beads and chrome would have looked.  I used Touch Retouch to remove some stray beads and a line that was not part of the concrete base. Used clarify in native app but no other editing.  I did not want to take the time to see if I could use a mask in Snapseed to darken the drape area to the left in the image.

Downtown Greensboro Tall Buildings from Stairs of Elm St. Parking Deck

Today I got a reminder from Facebook that I had posted this iPhone image a year ago.  I was in downtown Greensboro, NC,  and wanting to get some architectural shots. These are challenging with the wide angle lens of the iPhone as buildings can be distorted . This image was taken with the 5s HDR mode.  I was going up the stairs of the parking deck off Elm Street.  It was about noon - 1 PM on a Sunday and not many people around. I did not have the SKWRT app but liked this shot and was recently thinking about taking it again. Pushed exposure sliders and sharpening to get the effect I wanted with PSE 11.    

Pirate Day at Jam,estown, NC City Park Festival 9/19/2015

Yesterday there was a Pirate Day at City Lake Park, Jamestown, NC.  I wanted to see if there were some photo opportunities there. I went after 2 PM and stayed to watch the small cannons being fired off after 3PM.   I only got one image of a pirate with the iPhone because most of the images I took with a Nikon P600.   The lighting situation was not good as the pirates were often in a mixed lighting situration which is not handled well by the iPhone.  I also needed more border around his left elbow. Even this image if you look close has digital noise due to high ISO. It was diffiult to capture him because he was constantly pacing while talking.  I learned a lot about pirates. Some were dressed to the 9s in Pirate garb, others had the workman type garb that would do the grunt work while sailing. It might have worked better if I used fill in flash for this image, but just because you choose that mode, does not mean the flash is always goingt to go off.  Just for the record, I do not like taking images of people and have very little experience with street photography.  I do not have a telephoto zoom lens for my iPhone.  Shot in Camera+, edited in PSE 11.

Milkweed Propellor - Excessive Sharpen for Texture Effect

Love walking in my neighborhood to look for images. Was out and about at noon and saw this milkweed propellor.  Not always the best time for taking photos due to excessive highlights. It was windy.  Pushed the sharpen to about 400 to get a texture effect.  Reminds we of a dancer twirling around.  Taken with Camera+ macro. Edited in PSE 11.

Dogwood Leaves Early Fall Color - My Neighborhood

Fall is not officially here but there are a few trees in the Triad of NC that are starting to change color.  I captured this image in my neighborhood of a dogwood with some leaves turned red..  Most of the leaf color change in our area occurs the end of October.   I wanted to try to get an image at eye level with the leaves backlit but those leaves were too high up to capture with an iPhone.  I may have to remember to bring my selfie stick with meas it has an extension rod. Camera+; edited in PSE 11 with sharpening to enhance the leaf structure and bark. I did some cloning of the pavement and holes in the leaves.

Spider But Not Itsy Bitzy

I was walking in the neighborhood and saw a big spider in a web.  I did try to grab that image. However, the spider web did not really show up except for the zig zag.  It was noontime and the angle of the light and light green grass background was not the best.  I will say my light shirt helped
to act as a reflector to fill in lighting.   I walked around the other side and it would not have been any better, probably worse as it was cement street. I really hate spiders.  Camera+ macro.  Edited with PSE 11.

Southern Porch - Church St. Downtown GSO

This image I took downtown in GSO on Sunday.  Lighting was not that great but I liked this porch which reminds me of homes in the South.  The sky is blown out from the sun coming from an angle behind.  I need to go back when it is morning or overcast to see if I can get a better image.  However, I never promised that all the images I posted would be great.  I think the side angle is good to show the chairs on the porch and it would have been nice if there was a person in one of the chairs. Then there is some sign in the yard and some bagworms in the tree limbs which I could have removed with Touch Retouch.  Native camera app iPhone 5C - slight editing in PSE 11.

Rust Vintage Look - Garbage Dumpster

When I was downtown at the Folk Festival on Sunday, I saw some rust on a garbage dumpster.  Decided to take a shot and see what I maybe able to do with the textures in PSE 11.   Taken with native i6  Camera app, HDR.  Did not really like the lighting but not able to move around for the specific rust spot I wanted.  Post processing l used Old Fashioned filter.  Increased the texture (grain) & changed the color of brown to include more orange coloration.  Sharpened in a medium range. Would like to try a different image with more side lighting in a.m.                                   "golden hour" to see if that depicts the rust better try to do macro with Camera+ app. . 

Ladder Sculpture - Part 2 Downtown Greensboro, NC - Endownment of the Arts 2015

Finally caught up to the date. 
I used the same reduced size image from the original posted yesterday to experiment a little with black and white.and then invert the image with a filter to give an infrared look on the right image. The post editing was done in PSE 11. The B& W image I maxed the shadows, highlights, midtones and then increased the darkness & contrast to get the effect I wanted. The clouds give a textured background to the image. Plan to take more images of this sculpture at different times of the day.  May not have any clouds next time. These images were taken about  5:45 p.m. EDST with native iPhone 5C.  

Ladder Sculpture Downtown Greensboro, NC - Endownment of the Arts 2015

 These images should have been posted Sun., Sept. 13th.  This is part of a sculpture for Endowment of the Arts that was done in conjunction with the 2015 Folk Festival in Greensboro, NC.  The scculpture itself contains over 500 ladders donated by 300 people.     Since there were a lot of people looking at the sculpture at ground level I decided to shoot for a design in the sky with the intention that I would play with filters and see what altered art or patterns I could use with these images.   The original image on the left is unedited.  It is a downsized file for the web so you will see some pixelization which can happen with lines. It was shot in HDR native 5C iPhone.  The right image was maximizing shadows, highlights, midtones  in PSE 11, and then applied the Saturatured Film effect x 4. Sharpening would have pixelated this image further.  I do plan to work with the original iPhone image before reduciing the file size for the web.  Plan to try more filters in various photo apps.  Tomorrow for the next images I post you will see B & W and and the negative (invert) of the same which reminds me of infrared.  

Mystery Blossom from Neighbor's Yard

This image should have been posted Sat. Sept. 12th
I took this image at my hair dresser's in her border area in front of her house.  I have admired this blossom for years and can't wait till August when these plants start blooming. I need to get some seeds to try to plant some in my yard.  She does not know the name nor how it got there as she said she did not plant it.  I love the coral color.  It is some type of low growing hibiscus if you look at the stamen.   Camera+ HDR, edited in PSE 11. Taken as  horizontal 3 x 5 but cropped to square. I got a little too close to the top border. Unfortunately these flowers do not make good cut flowers to put in water, and on the stem bloom less than 24 hours.  They close up early in the evening.  

OrnamentalGinger Lily (Ms Elizabeth) from Nannette's Yard

This image should have been posted Fri., Sept. 11th. This image is of an ornamental ginger lily from my garden. The stalk is over 7 feet tall and the siding on my house would not have made a good background.  I decided to bend the stem down and use the green lawn for a background.  This culrtivar is Ms. Elizabeth and it blooms earlier than the white cultivar I have.  It is also much shorter and should be able to get a better close up. The flower head blooms in stages and by the time the top has blossoms prime, the lower ones are looking wilted, etc.   Camera+, Edited slightly in PSE 11. If I have more blooms I may  try a still life with a stalk when top blossoms in bloom--may be able to get a better close up of the blossoms.  This plant is considered subtropical but I have had this plant winter over for 2 years and given away some baby plants.  

Ornamental Grass and Clouds in Sky

I am way behind in my posting due to attending a Photo Fest in Asheville, NC .Image should have been posted Thurs., Sept. 10th. There were clouds in the sky last week and I noticed some grass in the parking lot near IHOP restaurant. It was very windy but bright sun, and I think this imaged turned out with the effect I wanted.  I definitely did not want the McDonald's sign in the image, So it was cropped to square format. Camera+ HDR.  Edited in PSE 11 with minimal editing.  Hope to find more grasses/weeds to photograph along roadsides this fall.

Thistle Seedhead

I love late summer and fall photo opportunities. On Sunday found a thistle seedhead in a weed patch along the road.   Tried for a close up in color and then converted to B & W to see how that would look. Wanted to include leaf shape incase I use for garden journaling as helps with plant identification.  
Camera+ HDR-edits PSE.  Also used color variation to decrease blue since taken in late afternoon.  

Southern Dogwood Seedpod - Neighborhood

Was walking in the neighborhood and captured the left image close up of the Southern Dogwood.  Not all the fruit has this arrangement of berries.  This tree blooms with the white blossoms and is in another neighbor's yard.  The birds love this fruit. Camera+ HDR  Slight editing in PSE 11 which included some cloning of disfigured leaves. Did not use rule of 3rds or center because I was trying to get this particular seed pod and avoid others in the same area.

The image on the right is for reference.  It was taken with my Verizon cell phone before I had the iPhone in another neighbor's yard in spring 2013.  

Goldenrain Tree Blossoms on Pavement at GSO Arboretum

One of my favorite trees in spring through fall is the Goldenrain Tree (Koelreuteria paniculata).  It is native to Eastern Asia, China, & Korea.   As I was walking on the paved asphalt path @ GSO Arboretum,  I looked down to see the petals that had fallen to the ground -- as you can see a nice golden color in the image on the left. Unfortunately I did not think to take a closer image as I was thinking of this as a background when I get into digital imaging.. In another month there will be wonderful seed pods to photograph close up. I decided to do some altered art with this image because of the textures.  The image on the left I darkened and increased the contrast and sharpened.  The image on the right I wanted a more altered art effect.  So, I increased the highlights and midtones, sharpened to the max, then applied red color variation x2.   Taken in Camera + HDR mode.  I elected not to crop  the image.  This might be one to try to change to square , choose a filters and send in Instagram.  For more info, "Google" wikipedia.  

Ornamental Red Grass in Median at Reynolda Village, W-S, NC 8/29/2015

T his image should have been posted Sept. 6th, 2015.  I took this image of the red grass that was part of a median landscape at Reynolda Village in Winston-Salem, NC. I do not know the name of this cultivar. I wanted to just capture the grass but it was blowing in the breeze and  had coleus, banana plants, elephant ears in this same area. Depending on the angle, you could get parked cars too. The good thing was it was overcast when I took the image.  I had gone to a Paw Paw Festival and bought one these plants for my garden.  Camera+ app, edited the highlights, midtones, sharpened & applied slight vignette PSE 11.

Reynolda Garden Conservatory - Winston-Salem, NC 8/29/2015

Last weekend my friend, Pat, and I went to Reynolda Garden.  Spring is my favorite time to visit this garden as more pretty flowers are in bloom. They have a huge rose collection. It was overcast and I did try to take an image of their conservatory.  It is not very big but there were some shrimp plants, bromeleids, and orchids in bloom.  Camera+, HDR.   Used SKWRT app to decrease distortion. Slight editing in PSE 11. Afterward we went to eat at the Village Tavern which is in Reynolda Village shopping center adjacent to this builidng.

Fall Blooming Native Azalea (Rhododendron prunifolium) CU - GSO Arboretum 9/3/2015

Yesterday I went to the GSO Arboretum and took a shady trail which I usually do not take.  I found a real surprise.  There was a fall blooming native azalea in bloom.  Luckily it had a sign with the botanical name.  I could look up more info when I got home.   This is a Plum Leaf Azalea.(Rhododendron prunifolium).  NC is not shown on a map where this is commonly  found.  There was density between AL & MS ...images taken from Georgia.  My original image had a lot of disfigurement in the leaves.You are seeing the one I cloned in PSE 11.  I did not use the macro mode in Camera+ as digital zoom = decreased sharpness.

Snail Vine Blossoms CU at Reynolda Gardens, W-S, NC

This is an image of a snail vine (cork screw vine) blossom that I captured at Reynolda Gardens, W-S, NC, on Saturday about noon. The botanical name is Cochliasanthus caracalla.  It is a perennial vine.  Because it is a close up the blossoms in the left area are immature and further back from the camera - not in sharp focus.  The mature blossoms should resemble the shape of a snail shell but this image does not show that very well.  Camera+ app, HDR.  Edited slightly in PSE 11.  

Macro Chinese Dogwood Fruit - Reynolda Garden, W-S, NC

This image should have been posted September 2nd, 2o15. 
 I took the left  image at Reynolda Garden in Winston-Salem on Saturday. However,  one of my neighbors has 2 of these Chinese dogwood trees.  Botanical name Kornus kousa.  The right image was taken this spring with the iPhone 5C native app. --no editing.   It blooms later than the flowering dogwood we are familiar seeing in NC in spring.  The left image is the fruit which appears late summer and into the fall. According to the Missouri Botanical Garden website these berries are exceptionally large (about 1.25 inches) and are edible (inner custard-like consistency) off the plant. Birds also love the fruit.  Elliptic-ovate, pointed, dark green leaves (to 4” long) turn orange-red to scarlet in autumn. The left image taken with Camera+ app, HDR, macro setting.   Edited with PSE 11: cropped, increased midtones, sharpened. 

Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly - Bill Perry's Garden

 This should have been posted on Sept lst, 2015.  Took this image in my neighbor's backyard on a cloudy afternoon.  The butterfly was on the move and this was the best I could do for sharpness.  It is a tiger swallowtail.  Taken with the native app, HDR mode. Butterfly bush in the background not sharp due to shallow depth of field.  PSE 11 for editing:: cropped, midtones increased, sharpened, and slight vignette applied. I would like to try early morning and perhaps can find some Eastern swallowtail butterflies...maybe less active when cooler. This image was posted to Photo Nuts and the iPhone Editing FB sites.