As November nears its close of another year, I am reminded again of the change in focus of subject matter that happens this time of year. Color is certainly scarce now in Michigan. Deciduous trees are mostly bare, and many plants show their signs of drying up awaiting the weight of winter snow to bring them to the ground. The subject matter doesn’t exactly jump out and slap you in the face now as it does in the peak of fall color. It takes a bit more of a careful eye to see the interesting things that are still around.
Frosty mornings are becoming more frequent. We haven’t had too many mornings yet that have dipped below freezing yet, but this morning was one of them. Open areas had a good bit of frost and I noticed fog in the air on the pre-dawn dog walk. I felt inspired to get out the camera today for the first light.
The woods near my home are a bit of a graphical mess as I have mentioned before – thorny thickets and tangled poison ivy vines everywhere, fallen trees scattered about. Even with the simplifying nature of fog, it can be difficult to do many scenics. So I turned to macro photography, looking for interesting elements that caught my eye. The frost pattern on this leaf was one of them. So many questions come to mind when I see something like this. Why did the frost form in this way? The leaf appears exactly as I found it lying on the ground. Why did other leaves right next to it have no frost at all? Isn’t it interesting that the frost pattern is in the shape of a tree or a branch?
Then I spotted the curly nature of drying goldenrod stalks and their leaves. Quite interesting graphically, so I photographed them. I don’t normally pay much attention to goldenrod stalks when they are showing their vibrant greens because the shapes don’t seem as interesting. “Dead” things sometimes make better subjects – go figure!
I didn’t make it very far into the woods. I probably made most of the images this morning within an area of 20 square feet. Such is the case with macro and exploring details on a November morning. The closer you look, the more you discover. Certainly, when I see these images, I think November.
The images in this post were processed by Adobe Lightroom 2, luminosity masks in Photoshop CS3, and use of the Topaz Detail plugin. Original captures were made with a Nikon D700 and a Nikkor 200 mm micro (macro) lens at ISO 400.
Heather, Lynda – thank you for taking time to comment – I appreciate the feedback.
I completely agree with the points you both make – it is a time of year where our attention is drawn to different details.
Lovely work. I love macros and I know what you mean about shooting in a limited space. You could spend hours on a few square feet, capturing textures in the woods!
When the color fades away, I find it is time to really start paying attention to texture, as you have shown here with the frosty leaves and goldenrod stalks. Nicely done.
Thanks so much folks. I appreciate your continued support and comments.
That frosty leaf is just fantastic
“Color is certainly scarce now in Michigan.”
I know what you mean. This is a tough time of the year in Pa. as well. This year, I am focusing more on motion blurs and multiple exposures to try to create interest. Your close-up frost images are very nice. I particularly like the Goldenrod image. The swirls are beautiful!
Your images and comments are encouraging me to get out into the meadows and woods and look for images. These are just lovely.
Very nice. I am fascinated by how my perspective changes when I start shooting macro. Especially how much more aware of detail I become. I think it’s a good exercise for any photographer every now and then.
Really nice images, Mark – great textures & patterns. I’m looking forward to frost here!
– Jack
Very lovely and November’ish images, Mark. The subdued color and intricate details of these two are wonderful. It appears the landscape here may be a few weeks behind that of Michigan–the trees retain some color and first frost was this past weekend. So these photos may be a view of things to come for us. 🙂
I really like the first one, Mark. The composition, details, simple colours and frost shapes is what attracts me. The curls of Goldenrod are interesting but not absolutely my cup of tea. Well done!
You’re lucky that you already have so low temperatures. We have one of the warmest Novembers for last years in Europe. Today it was 10 degrees centigrade above zero when I woke up at 6 o’clock. We had only couple days when temperature got to 0 and I think that only one night when it got below 0.
I love the goldenrod shot. Very cool. We had the potential for below-freezing temps the other night, so I put a very watery abstract painting outside, in hopes that the frost would form & the paint would dry that way. Didn’t get cold enough, but I still like the idea & will try again when we do get below freezing…maybe…someday. *L*
The curls of the goldenrod leaves are great for an abstract – the B&W treatment is excellent. Neat pattern in the first one…