Gallery of White Flowers
Seedlip Spice 94 Review
Seedlip is a brand of distilled, non-alcoholic botanical spirit, like gin¹ but without the alcohol and juniper. Did I hear you exclaim ‘What!’? Quite!
I chose Seedlip Spice 94 as an alternative last time I was offered alcohol on a flight well before my idea of lunch time. ‘A complex blend of spice and citrus’ sounded just up my street and it’s sugar- and sweetener-free too. When asked what I wanted to drink with it², I confessed my ignorance and was handed a can of Fevertree tonic.
Curious, I sipped the Seedlip neat. That’s not what we are supposed to do and if you try it, you’ll see why. My first thought was clove.³ Continue reading “Seedlip Spice 94 Review”
The Big Reveal For July Squares
I’ve been waiting to find out what Becky’s prompt will be for JulySquares, a daily challenge that will run for a month from 1st July. We are all welcome to drop in and out if daily posting is too much – whatever suits our style of blogging. In any case, most of the fun will be in seeing what everyone else has to share. Continue reading “The Big Reveal For July Squares”
Abandoned, Rusty, Eye Candy
I sympathise if you don’t see this as eye candy. Well, kind of. I’m sharing these pictures for HeyJude’s Textures challenge, so if you don’t like rusty old cars, you can blame her.
Vertical Form (St Ives) By Barbara Hepworth With Reflections
I do like this picture, although it has as many accidental elements as purposeful ones: layers, patterns, textural contrasts and red herrings.
Although I lined the sculpture up reasonably well with the r/h edge of the frame, the reflections make it look all catawampus. That doesn’t just allow me to use the word my sweetheart taught me (we would say ‘skew whiff’) but it also makes the picture seem more abstract. That seems fitting.
I tried cropping closer, but prefer the picture with the distractions in. They have an unsettling effect and they provide context for a bronze sculpture that has St Ives in its name.
I suspect the reflections of the houses humanise the bronze more than if the clean lines of a gallery were behind it. The sculpture seems to gaze out, watchfully or wistfully.
The colour combination is muted – natural stone, grey, plus a languid take on the traditional blue and white that symbolises Cornwall – helping the gleaming sculpture hold its own visually in the gallimaufry. Continue reading “Vertical Form (St Ives) By Barbara Hepworth With Reflections”
Pink Climbing Rose: An Exercise
HeyJude is running a photo challenge during 2020 on her Travel Words blog designed to get us thinking about the techniques of taking pictures. You can find out the details and monthly topics here. January’s topic is Composition and Framing. These crops are inspired by some of Jude’s instructions – I’ve added them in italics, so you know the intention.
Clearly identify your subject. Not as easy as it might seem. The rose is my main interest, but the setting is worthy of attention too (around an oval opening on the curved outside fence of Diarmuid Gavin’s garden at RHS Harlow Carr), so I was slightly torn, wanting to give a glimpse of the inside.
It was an overcast summer evening. The curve of the wall and habit of the rose meant shooting into the light, creating a bright glare. The original picture has a few more inches of haze at the top, and bright light always draws the eye away from the subject. I’ve removed some of it with the effect that the crop is neither landscape, portrait or square. I like to keep the traditional proportions if I can, but throwing aside the rules and cropping any way the subject demands is often the difference between a poor picture and a decent one.
Move in closer to your subject, but not too close. While the flowers in the first picture were blobs, more of their character comes out here. Continue reading “Pink Climbing Rose: An Exercise”
So Many Challenges, So Little Time!
…and that’s excluding real world challenges, as this post is about blogging ones. These pictures were inspired by Nancy Merrill’s challenge: Textures.
Nancy is one of several community-spirited WordPress bloggers who fill the breach left by the late (still lamented) Daily Post Photo Challenge. I met many blogging buddies through the Daily Post and loved seeing their sometimes wildly individual takes on each subject. The official WordPress format made it a cinch to navigate. When the challenge ended I felt dispirited, not foreseeing that the mantle would pass to so many other hosts.
Cee Neuner maintains a useful list of WordPress challenges in the For The Love Of Challenges section of her blog. My hat’s off to Cee – her list is more inclusive and up to date than the Daily Post’s list ever was. She lists photography and writing challenges and I’ve just noticed a couple of musical ones are listed too, although I know from experience not to inflict my musical taste on anyone not similarly afflicted. 🙂
Shell house grotto at the Edinburgh Botanic Garden
The grotto celebrates The Queen Mother and features her initials
Susan Rushton 