Recording the beauty of long-stemmed flowers

Hello all! My family had a lovely visitor who is friends with my brother from college stay with us. She is in the coast guard, and needed a place to stay for a few days, so we opened up our house to her, and in return, she gave us some lovely long-stemmed flowers! I'm not sure what kind they are, but they are beautiful! This is the first time I've ever seen any long-stemmed anything! I might have to treat myself to some later on in the winter when things tend to look a little gray around here....

Here's any interesting fact: in Russia and many other Eastern countries, it is considered rude to give an even number of flowers. I believe that this gesture has something to do with death or bad wishes. I also know that in flower arrangement, it is best to use an odd number of flowers so that the eye can find a place to rest and look at instead of peering between two flowers or something. So our visitor (who is well-traveled) gave us five long stemmed flowers. 

I thought they deserved to become photographic evidence of beauty :)

I couldn't get all five in the picture, but I thought I would try to show their long stems. Aren't the colors beautiful together? And the petals really are this rich deep pink.

The underside of the petals are equally interesting

The rest of these pictures were all taken in the filtered sunlight in my dining room. They turned out rather well with nice shadows!

I love the little detail of the fluted ends of the petals and how the light highlights them!

Have a nice day! It is supposed to be up in the 80s here (this is considered boiling where I live :P )

A few pictures revisited...

So I have finally had some down time in my school work, and I turned to flipping through a few folders of my pictures. And then I got the urge to do some black and white photos, but didn't want to go out into the rainy weather (yes, I know it was sunny just last weekend....), so I did what I don't normally do, and altered a few of my pictures on picmonkey (yay free websites!). And here are the results! I'd like to know what you think of them...better? worse?

I paired each one with its original:

Original:

Altered:

The main change here was simple turning the picture black and white. I think it worked well because of the fine detail, but the background got a bit messy. I cropped it to try to remedy that, but am still not entirely happy with the outcome. I'm glad that only the center is in focus though, which helps take the eye away from the back.

Original:

Altered (1):

I majorly boosted the color on this one. I really like how it brought out the green, but still kept the mystic fog. 

Altered (2):

I simply turned the one above black and white, and the boosted color helped make sharper contrasts and detail. I can't tell if I like this one better than the latter, but I definitely like these best out of my alterations in this round.

Original:

Altered:

I boosted the color here as well, which made the purples much deeper and more of a royal purple versus a lilac purple. Then I zoomed in and cropped. I've never zoomed in on a picture before and then cropped it! It give it a more computer-monitor-y feel to it, because I think the colors are too fake and the zoom makes everything a bit blurry. But I think too much detail might have actually made it too busy?

So what do you all think? Which is your favorite? Least favorite?

I actually find these alterations quite calming and fun! haha

The lovely weather outside

It is sunny outside! But as much as I love the sun, I don't love the heat. At all. The grass is always greener on the other side, huh. I'm also getting over a cold, so not many pictures, but I passed these lovely things along my way to class. And I only had my phone with me at the time, so these were all taken with my phone's camera. Enjoy the sun!

Someone planted all these pretty windmills (I actually don't know what they are properly called...) all along the grassy areas of campus. Aren't they so pretty? In the sunlight, they silver would reflect the sunlight, and the grass became a sea of stars.

The buttercups are blooming! I have a lot of good memories from elementary school of picking bouquets of buttercups. I liked how if you held them under your chin, the sunlight would reflect the shimmery yellow onto you.

These puffy flowers made me entirely too happy for no reason. But they look all plush and fuzzy! I hope you enjoy them as much as they made me happy inside, haha.

Trip to the Greenhouse with The Boyfriend!

On a particularly bad day, The Boyfriend cheered me up by accompanying me to our school's greenhouse. I had been there many years ago--in middle school(!)--but he had never been before. It was a very fun experience, and we saw many beautiful and cool looking plants. Here is a tiny sample of them. Enjoy!

This cactus (I think) was outside the greenhouse. I like the contrast of the milky gray and the dark tips of the edges. I tried to avoid as much of the green grass in the background, but this is as best as I could get. The other picture was a little too zoomed in for my taste.

Fuzzy cactus! I have a special place in my heart for cacti. Maybe it's the thought that they are so poky yet so cute! Their little armor brings to mind the image of a little kid trying to brandish a weapon to protect himself. So little, and yet so hopeful.

But my goodness, these lily pads are freaky. They have SPIKES on the bottom! It's like those people you meet who you think are nice and innocent, and then they turn out to be all claws and biting. For some reason I only remember these lily pads from the previous time I visited those 8 years ago. It's probably because of the scary spikes...

I'm sure I've seen these fragile little flowers before on cacti. But what is interesting about this picture is the line of spikes hiding on the right. Such an unexpected image...

Isn't it interesting how some cacti have flowers that bloom in a ring around the top? I like this contrast between pink and white.

It looks like a pokemon!

This little guy was growing off the side of another cactus. I'm not sure why the cactus looks different though...

This was in the rain forest section of the greenhouse. What an interesting flower...

The rest of the pictures were form the tropical section.

I like the soft washed out color of this flower coupled with the water droplets. But the background washes it out a little, I think.

The flower of a lily pad. It looks a little creepy...But a beautiful color.

This reminds me of a caterpillar. They are tiny little flowers all bunched together. The Boyfriend thought they were cool looking.

The colors remind me of a more delicate poinsettia  But I find the shape of the right flowers intriguing. They look like origami balloons.

This pink little ball was really unexpected.

Photos from the week

Sorry I have disappeared all of a sudden!

It is spring break now, so I've been busy just trying to relax. But here are some photos from finals week and this past week!

 First: The cherry trees are beginning to blossom int eh Quad! I'm so excited!

I was walking my friend back to her dorm after having breakfast, when we came to the quad. I hadn't been through because my finals took me elsewhere, but all of a sudden, I was met with this sight of pink!

I like the effect of the trees creating this curve that dips down in the middle, sandwiched between the blue/white sky and the green grass.

I finally had a chance to hang out with my boyfriend (for only two hours, unfortunately), and noticed these chairs back to back, creating this symmetrical yet non-identical curve. I loved it! I like how there are such simple details that can make one appreciative.

In the middle of the backyard back home, there is one lone daffodil. This is it. But it's beautiful out there, all alone. The petals are so delicate, folding and bending as they wish.

I really need to learn how to photograph flowers from more original and inventive angles.

Downtown, this was the view in the sun was setting. The cherry blossoms matched the pink of the clouds!

I saw this little rainbow above the rooftops of a building. A tree nearby, was such an interesting sight complementing the oddity of the rainbow.

My old camera has two weird lines on the lens, but I can't find it when I look for them. I'm getting it cleaned soon, hopefully. In the meantime, I try to camouflage them in the dark areas of the picture, haha. One is in the shadow of the building.

The bright blue sky brings so many possibilities.

The wide angle created such an interesting point of view, making the sky stretch so much further than usual.

Do you see the mysterious shape in the left top corner? It looks like a birdcage. But in reality, it is the lantern inside my house, backlit by the sunset.

Some beautiful things today

Hello! I'm in a great mood right now (as in this past hour, haha), even though things in my life are complicated and hectic right now....and add onto that, it's final's week!

But here are some pictures I was able to capture on my way to the last day of class on Friday!

This bird was so quick, but it stayed still for just a moment so I could take a few pictures. I had another one that had a better composition, where the bird was facing the camera, and its body matched the line created by the line in the sidewalk, but it came out blurry :( Boo. Oh well, this one captured every detail of the bird, down to the gleam on its eye, which I thought was interesting too.

It was difficult to focus on the bird instead of the cement, so that was the challenge for this picture. Finally got one right!

This picture was too good to pass up. This mother and her son were crossing the street to catch the bus, and I kept my eyes on them until I saw them approaching the bus map. Then I pulled out my camera and took a picture. I was going to walk away, when I decided to take one more, as I realized the boy was beginning to stand up on his toes to reach the same spot his mom was pointing at. I thought that the coordinating color of her pants and his coat, combined with the joined pointing was a great combination for this moment. I'm glad I took another shot because I like this one better than the first one!

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Photos from today: 3.8.13

Here are some pictures from today:

I woke up this morning, and it was incredibly foggy! But thankfully it cleared up and the sun even came out for a bit!

I like how this picture mutes all the colors, and the resulting look is very somber.

By night, it was cold and the cars were streaming down the freeway. I always liked watching cars at night. I think the sound of them rushing by is peaceful and calming; I don't know why, but it just is. 

Also, the first thing I noticed when I took this picture was the one awkward car with only one headlight...did anyone else notice it? It doesn't really help that it's in the middle of the picture...oh well.

Drive safely!

Don't worry! I just changed the blog background.../ Pictures from today

Hi! I'm sure you've noticed that I changed the background and colors of my blog. I decided I wanted my blog to feel a bit less sterile (you have to admit that all that white space was begging to be in a hospital or lab) since I ended up using it more than I first anticipated. So I've warmed up the background and chosen colors that I think are a bit more complementary to the colors of the photos/weather (haha) around here.

That said, if anyone did a double take when they ventured here, it's still me, Kirsten, and this is still a photography blog. If anyone has troubles with reading headings or anything, let me know!

Anyways, enough of my jabber. On to photos from today:

I thought this was an interesting perspective of the chandelier of lights in a nearby dorm. It really fits the theme of "light" (if I were to have one, that is...)

I saw this kid and his dad on a walk across campus. Thought it was really cute. I was trying to get them in mid-step, but I think it looks a little like the kid is not on the ground at all, haha.

Someone tied this flower onto the statue's hand. I'm not sure what it was for, but there was also a necklace with a star of David on it on the statue's other hand. I really like it when people do art and stuff like this, and I love that the campus is open and receptive of it.

As I walked past this patch of grass, it was completely littered with leaves. I thought it made for an interesting picture. I really liked how the leaves were not flat or droopy. They were sort of frolicking in the grass instead.

These two twins were in the Quad today. The more outgoing one was dancing around and having a lot of fun. I thought this picture showed his enthusiasm.

I don't know what's wrong (if anything) with this flower, but part of the flower is...gone? I thought it made for an interesting picture, like a "window" into the flower.

Isn't this a great view? I'm so lucky to have such a nice view of the mountains. This was taken during sunset, just as the clouds opened and reveal the range. It's been cloudy all weekend, but I was happy to see some nice colors finally, even if it was only for a bit.

Hope your weekend was great!

morning, midday, and evening

Here are a selection of pictures which I thought conveyed different emotions and parts of the day. All of them were taken on the same day, but throughout the day.

Morning:                            lkjljlkjlkjljlj;lkjlkjlkj                                      

The dew on the grass coupled with the harsh morning (overcast) light represents the morning

I liked how I was able to get the water droplets in focus!

Midday:              ldkajfdlakjljljlja;fkldjsa;djs;ojlja

Midday is when people travel around and there's still opportunity to have an adventure.

I really like the arch created by the trees in this picture.

Afternoon:                                         jlkjlkjlkjlkjl

The day starts to wind down, and there are two modes: either people are frantically running around before dinner, or the pace of the day is slowing down, and the day feels old.

I like this sign. It feels antique with the color palette and the old, broken sign. But the word "Flowers" itself is a bright and cheery object, and I like that contradiction.

In this particular photo, I tried to frame the object with the tree and pole since I couldn't get them out of the way. (If you can't get rid of it, use it!)

Evening:                                    lkjlkj

With evening comes serenity. It is calm outside, and we have a chance to pause and reflect on our day--the things we did, and the people we met. 

The pastel color palette that started the day also ends the day, and perfectly conveys our tranquil harmony found by day's end. 

I particularly like the colors reflected off the rain-slicked tennis courts in this picture.