"April's Fireworks"

I took this while conducting a photo workshop. I was demonstrating to my class the process of bracketing exposures for blending in Photoshop. It was just a point and shoot effort for demonstration purposes. For the rest of the time while the sun set, I concentrated on the students. The light was really good, but I kept my focus. I had no expectations for these shots, but since it was all I came away with, I had to give them a go. Five exposures with a range of 11 stops. These backlit flowers and grasses glow, especially since the stalks are covered with tiny hair like splinters. It was fortunate that there was nearly no breeze. The only need for the darkest exposure was to retain all of the detail around the sun. Interesting thing is that this is a wide angle shot, so the actual sun is much smaller than the circle of light. Since my camera was set at F16, the brightest light near the sun came out as a near perfect circle. After concluding our shoot, we headed out, only to witness an increase in color and pattern in the sky. It was amazing to witness and even more amazing to actually not point my camera at it. I'm still grumbling, but that's how it goes when you are on the job. No better job I guess! 

Thanks for taking a peek. The flowers were growing in various directions and gave me

the impression of sparklers or fireworks exploding. I appreciate any feedback!

I've attached a cropped cross section of the flowers to reveal the hairs I mentioned and how they increase the backlight glow.

For something very unexpected....I think you have an end result that is most pleasing to the eye........and I would have loved to be in on that class....the subject is one thing Iam very much interested in.....lovely detial, light, and 'blending'.............congrats...............I love it, Gail

Well exposed image, wonderful detail in the foreground. Compositionnally, the alternate layers of greens and yellows, dark and light, work pretty well.

Mark- Great result and thanks for the explanation.  Interesting and informative. Take care. Jim

Great shot...

Mark,

Love your photos, excellent quality! I also live in Bakersfield and have been going to some of the same locations. I would be very interested in attending a workshop with you. Please let me know if and when it might be available.

Thank you Gail, Claude, Jim, Stu and Dennis! Dennis, I will be running another workshop on Saturday, May 8th and the following Saturday, May 15th. It is a two week course and I am conducting it in conjunction with Juliana's Gallery, so you would sign up with her. This will be an intermediate class, but I will expect a cross section of experience, so beginners could also benefit. Meanwhile, if you have a fair amount of experience, we will be doing more of this type of photography (multiple exposure blending) as well as pano stitching. The first week will be a location shoot and the second week will be lecture and post processing. I have been doing the workshops for a short time and I am still cutting my teeth, but the price is very reasonable ($75 per student). If you are interested, call Juliana at 327-7507. Thanks for the inquiry!!