There are photographers who specialize and work only in macro photography (super close ups). I’m definitely not one of them as I much prefer shooting people. However I have a great macro lens and from time to time I catch some pretty cool macro shots. I figured I’d share some recent ones here.

Green Water Drop Macro:

We were watering the lawn and some of the water was hitting the apple tree leaves. The sun was shining through the trees on the other side of the yard and I thought there was potential for a few good macros. I’d say the potential was there.

I love this shot. Especially the little glint on the water drop. The drop is so clear in the full size photo you can see my reflection. This photo is now my computer’s desktop wallpaper.

I love my 50mm f/2.0 macro.

Wasps Macro:

I was outside playing with my girls and there were several wasps flying around. I did some investigating and found 2 new nests being built in the BBQ. They were so busy building they let me get pretty close with my macro lens. Thank goodness for live view because there was no way I was putting my face that close.

Sadly the wasps didn’t survive the poison sprayed in their direction. I hope nobody calls PETA.

Did I mention that I love my macro lens?

#28 Warm/Cool Bench

For some reason I’ve recently been drawn to the contrast between warm & cool colors.

This last week a group of us got together to take pictures of a band. The location was the parking garage at the Museum of Arts & Culture (MAC) in Spokane’s Browne’s Addition neighborhood. Here are some of the shots—including 2 of the other photographers standing in while I was setting up my lights.

This was a good exercise in visualizing the shot I wanted and getting the lights set up accordingly (except for the great pattern on the floor which I didn’t notice until I shot a few).

The lighting set up is as follows. A flash with a blue gel on it sitting on a stand behind subjects at camera right shot through a metal grate and kept from bleeding all over the musicians by the truck that was parked in some of the shots. A flash with a grid on it camera left. A flash with a grid on it camera right (or below the camera in some of the shots). I used radio triggers for the flashes.

A photographer may not need flashes/lights for every photograph, but I’d like to see a “natural light” photographer get these shots.

#26: Decayed Paint

I thought this was a nice contrast of warm and cool colors in an interesting texture

#27: Sky Writing

This is a combination of jet trails and telephone wires that reminded me of the chalk lines on the board in elementary school when I was learning to write.