Gateway Gardems - Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly; Green Echinacea Blossoms

 Went to Gateway Gardens, off East Lee St., GSO, today.   I managed to capture a Tiger Swallowtale butterfly  in some Lantana blossoms using the telezoom  Panasonic camera.  The image on the right is of a cluster of green colored Echinacea.  The lighting helped to show texture. 

Zinnia Collage - Google Photos

Today:  August 19th is World Photography Day.   I wanted to capture some images with my Panasonic camera.  I first went to Gateway Gardens, in GSO.  Then, I went to PJ Ciener Garden in Kernersville, NC.  The later botanical garden had a lot of zinnias in bloom.  I captured about 15 single close ups of some with different colors and petals, etc.   Decided I wanted to download them to Google Photos and create a collage.   The program arranged the composition and I am not sure if I can alter. the placement.  I had previously edited the images in Windows 10 Editor.  You can save the collage as a JPEG file. Images were taken with my Panasonic ZS70 camera. 

Greensboro Science Center Black Monkey & Llama CU

I went to the GSO Science Center to capture some images because I thought it was World Photography Day.  NOT!!   It is not until Sunday, August 19th.   The photo of the black monkey was my favorite, but the Llama chewing on grass is my 2nd.   Minor editing in PSE 15. Images taken with Sony a700 camera and 200mm telephoto lens.

Ornamental Coral Ginger Lilies in Bloom - Sarah Duke Garden, Durham, NC

One of my favorite flowers in a garden this time of year is the Ornamental Ginger Lily. The orginal cultivar I had in my garden was white but it blooms more in September. The blossoms look more like the one one on the left.  I captured 2 different cultivars at Sarah Duke Garden on Sunday 8/5/2018 and liked the lighting which was more to the side and back.  I was using my 200mm lens on the Sony a700. Minor editing in PSE 15.  This blog has more cultivar images and information about the ginger lilies.  https://www.plantdelights.com/blogs/articles/ginger-plant-lily-variegated-hedychium-lilies

Palms - Abstract Art Geometic Designs of Nature)

Sunday, went my photo friend, Pat, to Sarah Duke Gardens, in Durham, NC.  I was intrigued by the palms in the annual terrace garden about 10:30 a.m. EDST.   I liked the backlighting of the intertwined leaves that I took with my Sony A700 camera with 200 mm lens. Original design was great...but I also wanted to play with more abstract colors with filters in PSE 15 for the R image.  I used saturation & hue to change color. Then increased sharpness, used accented edges and posterized filters post processing.   

Chihuly Glass Hanging and Abstract Variation of Select Portion -Columbia Museum of Art, Columbia, SC

 In June my sister and I went to the Columbia Museum of Art in Columbia, SC. I saw a lamp hanging from the ceiling and decided to just capture an image of part of the glass to get a sense of texture.   I used my Panasonic with the telezoom to get just a portion of the glass hanging sculpture by the famous glass artist Chihuly.  The orange one on the left I did apply accented edges filter to make the design/texture more distinct and sharpened slightly.   The image on the left with the blue green and blue, I cropped a portion I liked the pattern, then use enhance color to change the hue and saturation.  Then sharpened to show a more graphic design look.  Both images will be shown at the TOPS camera meeting on Thursday night.   Instead of always using an image "as is". I keep saying "what if". I like to try for an abstract look. The post processing was done using filters in PSE 15.