It is snowy, but not icy (yet), and for that I am thankful.  I filled the tub with water and made a pot of soup that could be reheated on the wood stove, just in case the power went out.  I swear I still have PTSD (Post traumatic Stress Disorder) from the November Ice Storm of 2008. Otherwise, I have been pottering all day doing things that I don’t usually have time for.

So, I had this idea the other day to paint some boards that I can use as I photograph plants and flowers around my house and garden.

And today I did it.

My daughter is ever the trash saver and transformer.  She saved the various shaped wooden boards that came in the packaging of my new holiday treadmill.  Her plan was to paint pictures on them.   I was working here at the kitchen table as she finished a portrait of our cat, when I saw the extra boards and the vast amounts of extra (already squeezed from the tube) paint that would surely go to waste if I didn’t pounce.

These (above) are what I came up with. I am fascinated with how much more interesting the images of the winterberry twigs are… especially if you consider what the backdrop looked like before I inserted my quickly painted boards.

Also, I am spending some of this ‘snowed in’ day trying to figure out my camera — one of my ‘boards’ is painted on two sides.  I took these two images mere seconds apart (so no change in light, camera setting or position), and look at the difference.  All I did was flip the front board over from the yellow side to the blue side.   Can anyone explain to me why the red looks so different in each of these two images?

So now you have an explanation for what will surely be a new era of plant photography here on Studio ‘g’.