Harlow Carr Flowers

RHS Harlow Carr gardens seems to have been popular with PU members this year, so it was clearly necessary to visit (and not for the first time) while in the area last week. Some of the big drifts of flowers were lovely, but somehow didn't seem to inspire when looked at through the viewfinder . So here are a few individual flowers that caught my attention. All handheld, K3 + F135mm f2.8.

Rain stopped play at lunchtime, but a good lunch at Betty's was adequate distraction .

Thoughts, comments are welcome as usual.

1.



2.



3.



4.



Steve

All nicely composed, Steve, and number 2 stands out for me. Whilst demonstrating my horticultural ignorance by being unable to name the flower, the composition suggests the flower is reaching up to catch any passing rain drops (or to attract pollinators, I suspect).

I find the back-of-scene flower in number 1 distracts from the main subject, but only because I've noticed it. This is somewhat similar to the blemish you pointed out on Gareth's homework, which I would not have noticed otherwise

Bettys is always worth a visit, albeit the cafe at Harlow Carr can become very busy. I used to refer to Bettys as somewhere you'd take your parents to when they visit, but I have frequented their establishments more than ever during the last ten years or so. A characteristic of no longer being in my twenties, I think

Number 2 for me as well with number 4 also standing out for the textures on the flowers and leaves. Number 3 suffers from a problem I always have when photographing bright red flowers where the red colour loses detail.

I visit Harlow Carr regularly and there is always something different to see and capture through each of the seasons and then of course the bonus of a Betty's afternoon tea.

Nice...particularly like 1 and 2.

regards

Karlo

The first 2 have an edge over the others for me - with the strengths of the set being isolation and simplicity, keep shooting

Thanks folks.

According to the labels by the plants, No 1 is 'Oxalis Melanosticta' (aka black-spotted wood sorrel), No. 2 is 'Gentiana Species'. Both were in border beds in the alpine house, so a limited choice of angles and definitely 'do not touch'. Nos. 3 and 4 were outside, but still difficult to get a good angle because of the 'do not touch' and 'keep to the path' rules.

PRYorkshire - Yes, bright red can be a pain, the problem wasn't obvious at the time. I might try to get more detail out of the raw file.

Steve