Purple Ornamental Kale - Ruffled Center CU - Neighborhood

Found a nice purple ornamental Kale when I was walking in the neighborhood.  Thought the center would look good as a close up. Camera+, iPhone 6.  Edit in PSE 11.  Sharpened to the Max to show more detail in the ruffled edges if you zoom in close can see the purple veins.   .  

Ornamental Kale CU @ A & A Nursery, Brown Summit, NC

This image should have been posted on Friday, Dec, 18th,.  In the winter time Ornamental Kale can be found in various border beds, by mailboxes,or in planters.  They come in various colors from greens and whites to dark purple/lavender.   I was at a nursery and took this image a couple weeks ago.  Not like you have a choice of light or the best surroundings.  So, I decided to take a close up. iPhone 6, Camera +,  used accent edges filter in PSE to make the texture stand out..

Ornamental Grass - Green & White

Ornamental grass can provide textures to an image.  I did not want to take a picture of the standard upright look with sky etc.  This one I was looking down from the top to the middle of some stalks for a different perspective. You can see some close up details of the fronds. iPhone 5c, do not know if HDR on.  Edited with PSE 11.  Did Quick Fix, then enhanced green color under color variation as wanted to get rid of yellow color cast in the midtones.  

Red & White Berries -Climbing Spindle Tree Sarah Duke Gardens, Durham, NC

Image should have been posted on Mon., November 9th, 2015.   Found these berries on an unlabeled plant at Sarah Duke garden on Sunday.  I took it in the horizontal mode, but thought with the arrangement of the berries I should really crop it.  As you can tell it is not an exact square.  I had to ask a horticulturalist at the garden about the identification of this plant.  See Comment.  The information from the web site she provided showed that the distribution of the plant is more likely to be in the Northeastern part of the US, i.e Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, New Hampshire. 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.

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.

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.

Osage Orange Fruit - Green Monochrome

This should have been posted Wed. 8/19/2015.   I was walking in the neighborhood last week and saw that the Osage orange (Machura pomifera) tree fruit was starting to appear.  Because it is not ripe yet this made a monochrome image.  I was trying to do a close up in Camera+ but it almost looks like this fruit is floating if it were not attached with a stem.  When it is ripe it will be yellow and can have more texture.  Some people make bows with the trunks which can be very time consuming.  he neighbor said the first year it bloomed it was orange.  This tree has very sharp thorns.  In the spring it has pretty white flowers.  Post processing in PSE 11:  cropped, increased highlights, sharpened to show more texture.
For more info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maclura_pomifera

Pomegranate Blossom Midsummer - Azalea Leaves as Background

One of my neighbors has a Pomegranate (Punica ranatum) shrub/tree. His is an ornamental cultivar and the fruit is very small -no real pulp - just alot of seed.  This plant flowers spring through summer with bright coral, red,  or varigated coral flowers.  I picked one of the blossoms to be able to get a better close up shot with the owner's permission, and it did not include a lot of leaves.  It is difficult with an iPhone to hold the flower and then use the Carolina blue sky as a background to get a sharp image like I can do with my P & S digital camera.  So, I used my neighbor's azalea bush foliage for the background. Native camera app, HDR mode, no post processing.  Could have probably sharpened and cloned out the white area to the lower right corner or cropped to square format.  .  

Black & Blue Sage Blossoms

This is an image of my black & blue sage plant in bloom.  I have seen hummingbirds trying to get nectar.  Since humming birds are very fast and do not stick around very difficult to get an iPhone image of that action, especially if they can see you. iPhone 6, macro mode, HDR.  My friend, Sue Hughes gave me a couple plants last year and this year I have many plants and actually gave some plants to my friends.  No post processing.  I will admit to breaking off the stem with blossoms so that the leaves would be in the background for the image. Normally, they are at the end of the stalk & blowing in the breeze. This way the leaves can be used for plant ID. Good photo for a garden journal.  I could have used a vignette to make the blossoms appear more prominent.