After a day of shooting on Saturday, one might think I am all shot out for the weekend.  However, upon rising Easter morning, I look out upon that early morning light and think “I should go shoot the flowers on the bank!”

Pat decides he will come with us.  This is awesome because it’s hard to do a lot of macro shooting with Tisen trampling over everything.

Deciding to travel light, I put my 100mm macro lens on my camera and attach my camera to the tripod.  I grab my 5-in-one reflector and my extension tubes and that’s all I’m taking with me.  Pat takes Tisen and the three of us cross the street.

I suppose we might look a little odd to the families arriving in droves at the park parking lot.  There is apparently some live music event for Easter at Coolidge park and many folks are parking here at Renaissance park and walking the short distance on the riverwalk to get to Coolidge.  There are all kinds of children in their Sunday best carrying Easter baskets.  I am wearing a pair of cropped hiking pants and a black pullover also made for hiking accessorized with my five finger shoes.  Plus, I am carrying my reflector fully open, although it’s only 22” in diameter, I’m sure it looks odd.  The tripod over my shoulder might help explain some of this to those who are curious, but I’m sure it seems strange to be focusing (pun!) on flowers when there’s an Easter event going on next door.  I guess we all celebrate in our own way.

But this morning, the light is indirect, glowing like only morning light can, and it’s dry.  I manage to make my way down the steep hillside without trampling anything that won’t recover.  I try to fluff up the grass where I’ve stepped in the hope of not leaving any trail of where I’ve walked.  I work around the outskirts of the flowers, looking for a few isolated blooms that I can get to without crushing anything.  It’s a struggle to stand up the tripod and get really close to the bloom on the steep hill without either falling or smashing other flowers.  I manage to arrange things carefully so that when I’m done, there won’t be any permanent damage, but standing with my feet carefully placed in areas that were recently cleared of weeds causes me to bend over at a weird angle, straining my back.  I am getting quite a workout bending over the camera while balancing myself and trying to support my back with my stomach muscles.  Who knew photography was really a sport?

In the end, I’m reasonably happy with the shots I got.  A little more physical comfort might have led to some better shots, but to have had more physical comfortable, I would have done damage to the plants on the hillside, so I’ve decided less than perfect photos are better than damaged plants.

Related articles

• Reflection (nomadicmainstream.com)
• Up Tight and Extended (nomadicmainstream.com)