Lens-Artists Challenge: Curves

/ Pat

My many strolls around the Botanical Garden with camera in hand have given me many files to peruse for curves. The hard part was deciding which ones to showcase. To make the decision I evaluated the quality of the photograph, whether there was inherent beauty or interest, and the bottom-line-truth is that these are the ones I like best of all. They trigger fond memories and personal thoughts, some of which I will also share. Here are my gifts of curves and words.

The colors of this orchid drew me in, but I really enjoy how curvy they are and how the curves create ruffles.
This fond caught my eye because it was the only curved one within a cluster of straight spined fonds. It made me wonder what makes some parts of plants grow in unexpected ways. I shouldn’t project human attributes to plants, but it sure seems like it is leaning down to hear the whispered thoughts of the plant growing beneath. Maybe I need to do more leaning in to listen to what nature is telling me.
I fell in love the moment I saw this ornamental cabbage, I felt the excitement of finding a treasure while photographing it, and experienced the satisfaction of creation as I did some editing to make it look like what I remembered. What’s not to love about the ruffly curves, the freshness of rain drops, the purple veins. The only thing that could make this more beautiful is a little more photographer practice.
We are moving ever closer to the time when we will be moving back to Michigan so… Where the mind goes so does my search of files. I love how the soft fall/early winter light hits the gentle curves of grasses going to seed.
We were camping along Lake Superior last summer when a storm came through, creating big waves. Waves are just water that is curving over itself so I searched my files for a good crop of a wave in action.
The waves grabbed my full attention and it was only after I felt I had more than enough photographs of the waves that I turned around and saw the beautiful curve of the grasses in the stiff wind. Gee whiz, how lucky that I found a reason to take even more photographs.
We stayed just outside Munising and there are a lot of water falls in the region. I took this photo of the Au Train water fall, through the trees as I was walking down the steep dirt road towards the small power plant. Those are some pretty curves in the rock layers. This was in the fall; I bet it would be really pretty in the spring when the snow melt and rains swells the river.
We will be visiting our daughter in Winston-Salem on our way home and this reminded me of the curvy roads of the Blue Ridge Mountain Trail. This is a two-fer – a curved road and a curved bridge. Lovely.
Two days ago was the first day of Spring so I felt it only appropriate to include some curves of spring flowers – taken at Hidden Lake Garden (MSU) in southern Michigan.

There have been a lot of interesting photographic representations of curves posted for this challenge. You can check them out here and learn how to join in the fun.

19 thoughts on “Lens-Artists Challenge: Curves”

  3. Love them all, Pat – a beautiful gallery. The waves in the sea, and in the grasses…the orchid, the cabbage with its raindrops. You have a good eye for curves. The bridge and the road is my favourite – it has it all.

    Like

    Reply

  4. I can see why these are among your favourite photos, and they’re just right for this challenge! My favourites were the orchid and the ornamental cabbage with the rain drops 🙂

    Like

    Reply

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s