Exploring the wonders of creation through a 50mm lens...and other lenses too.

I don’t usually do timely or topical photo here on Weekly Fifty (case in point: last week’s shot of a purple leaf with a raindrop, which had pretty much nothing at all to do with Christmas) but I did think that this one might be fitting to close out the year. Not in any literal sense, since sunflowers and the end of the year don’t typically go together, but mostly because what this photo represents to me.

This has been a year of growth and change, but for many people, a year of uncertainty and even anxiety. Conflicts around the world as well as here at home, political unrest, economic uncertainty…the list goes on and on. And yet, the sun still rises. In dark days, such as the thick of winter when, in the northern hemisphere, daylight wanes and temperatures drop, the sun still rises. In difficult times, the sun still rises. Through it all, the sun rises as the earth turns, night gives way to day, and the blessings of the Lord are renewed each morning. This sunflower, as with most of its kind, looks to the light of dawn and unfurls its green shroud to greet the day with a sense of hope, purpose, perhaps even joy. (Though as I have said many times here on Weekly Fifty, I know very little about plants so that last description might be stretching things just a bit.) And that is a good reminder to me, and a bit of reassurance that even in the midst of challenges and difficulties, there’s always something to look forward to.

Which is why I thought today might be a good day for this shot :) I took it earlier in the year with my Nikon D750 and 105mm f/2.8 macro lens while walking across campus on the way to work, and specifically composed it in such a way as to get the blurry lights just behind and to the left of the yellow petals. It might seem like a simple thing, but those bits of bokeh, which were coming from the back of a delivery van, made a big difference in how the final shot looked. They gave it a sense of vibrance that was missing when I positioned myself differently with the lights out of the frame, and I’m glad I was able to get the shot looking like this. There’s also some fun bonus bits in the shot if you look carefully, such as a spider peeking out from a yellow fold and some wisps of webbing connecting a couple of petals on top, but even if all you see is just a yellow flower, then that’s just fine with me :)

And so that brings us to the end of another calendar year, while looking ahead to what comes next. Whatever is in store for you for 2026 I hope it’s good, right, and salutary, and your quiet moments bring peace, reflection, and perhaps even prayerful meditation rather than worry and anxiety. Hold on to what you can change, let the Lord take care of what you can’t, and in between it all, keep your camera in hand, and go out and take some cool photos.

YouTube link in case the embed doesn’t work.

Note: I was wrong about 14 years! The first Weekly Fifty photo was posted on March 5, 2013, which means this year will be 13 years.

One thing I have come to realize about myself as a photographer, or rather, the kinds of photos I enjoy taking, is that close-ups of things involving water are really cool. Some of my favorite shots over the years were captured after a nice heavy rain when the earth is coated in a high-gloss shine that lets things gleam and glisten in a way that they just can’t do otherwise. Earlier this year I did a whole series of posts that featured photos I took at the local botanic garden one rainy spring morning, and I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of taking these kinds of pictures. Of course I also hope to continue learning and growing as a photographer, branching out into new areas and trying new things so I can keep exploring areas of this art but at the end of the day, there’s a simple logic to why I keep taking macro photos on a rainy day: I enjoy it. And as Brian Shea so eloquently put it, Joy is reason enough.

The last time I got a photo like this, it wasn’t one single image but about a dozen that were stacked together. It’s interesting going back and reading my post about that single drop, because I said something that I’m not sure I entirely agree with:

the only way I could get the image I was going for was to just combine lots of exposures together.

As James Rebhorn’s character said in Independence Day, that’s not entirely accurate. One way, of course, is to use a large aperture and take lots of photos and stack them together. But another way is, well, to use a small aperture and take a single photo. The resulting images will differ in some key aspects, notably the out-of-focus areas (note how the 2023 image has a dreamlike quality to it, with all but the water drop being out of focus) but the single drop of water being sharp and in focus is very much present in this week’s photo despite being one single exposure instead of many stacked together.

I shot this at f/22, 1/200 second, ISO 1250, and I’m super happy with how it turned out. I’m particularly pleased with the subtle details lik ethe texture of the leaf, the handful of tiny water drops that are both in and out of focus, and the blurry background with sparkles shining like Christmas lights. I don’t know what kind of plant this is, but the way the leaf structure creates a surface that resists water and, as a result, causes drops to form large pools like what you see here…it’s just really cool. (Pardon my notable ineloquence, if you will. I’m just a blogger.) I’m planning to return to this spot in the coming months to see if I can get more like this, if for no other reason than I enjoy it. And that’s all the reason I need.

Over all the years I have been actively and intentionally photographing the world around me, as opposed to casual snapshots without much thought behind them (which should not be misconstrued as an implication that such pictures are inherently devoid of meaning and purpose) there are two things I keep coming back to that need to be in place for me to take a good picture:

1. I need to have my camera with me. Preferably one of my DSLRs, but any camera will do.
2. I need to actively seek out photo opportunities.

Other things help, for sure, but without those two things in place it’s not likely I’ll get much in the way of a good photograph. Or any photograph at all, if I don’t have a camera.

That, then, offers a bit of background, or perhaps context, for today’s photo. When I left for work on the morning I saw this scene I saw my camera sitting on the table and thought to myself “Do I really want to take the camera today?” A few reasons to answer with “No” included the usual slate of excuses:

1. The camera is too big and heavy
2. I might drop it
3. I don’t really want to today. Maybe tomorrow.

None of these, obviously, have much in the way of substance. And while it’s possible that I won’t get a good photo if I have my camera, it is not possible to get a good photo, or any photo, if I do not have my camera. So, being fresh out of excuses, I grabbed my D750 and 105mm f/2.8 macro lens, stuffed it into my bag, and headed out the door.

The sun was already up, but not by much, by the time I parked the car and walked a few blocks through campus to get to my building. Since I had my camera with me, I was actively looking for photo and not 30 seconds after leaving my vehicle I saw this scene:

Nothing special, right? Just a tree in front of the Business School building. Not so! It was actually an chance to take an interesting picture: the sunlight behind me, the green and brown leaf in front of me, and the lights on the building in the background, all combined to create an interesting, and quite fleeting, opportunity of which I was able to take advantage because I had my camera with me and was looking for interesting scenes to photograph.

A few clicks of the shutter later and I was back on my way down the sidewalk heading to my building, but with a fun image that I was glad to be able to capture.

Well folks, here it is. This is, and I mean this without any exaggeration and with all possible sincerity, the best shot of a bee I have ever taken. It’s the kind of picture I have been trying to get for years. This quest, you might say, say back in June of 2024 I got a picture of a bee going in for some nectar from a magnolia flower near my office on the OSU campus. I since snagged others like this one but never quite got what I was hoping for, which is a profile shot of a bee hovering near a flower. Not a butterfly, not a hummingbird…a bee, bumble or otherwise, about to have itself a snack while simultaneously picking up some pollen. The thing about this kind of shot is you can’t really plan it or create it. You just have to be in the right situation, with the right gear and, most importantly, a healthy dose of patience and preparedness…and hope something comes along.

And every once in a while, it does :)

Ironically, I guess you could say, I wasn’t even trying to take this picture. It was a pretty normal afternoon following a morning of light storms, and I went out for a walk while on a short break at work. I had my camera in hand, thinking I might come across something interesting that would be good to photograph, and I happened upon these large purple plants with bright violet blossoms, many of which contained huge drops of water that had pooled during the rain. These subjects were entirely static, so I had more than enough time (measured in seconds, perhaps minutes, mind you. I was on a quick break! Not out for an hours-long leisurely stroll) to adjust my exposure, play around with my point of view, and fire off several clicks of the shutter. It was a thoughtful, kind of contemplative exercise that made me appreciate being outdoors in mild temps after the earth had washed itself clean.

And then I saw the bees. Many of them that were probably there all along but didn’t really catch my eye, flitting from flower to flower and pausing only a few breaths before heading to the next one. I tried to follow a few of them but that’s kind of an exercise in futility since they are so quick and nimble and there’s only so much you can do with a 105mm prime lens when trying to capture subjects like this. So instead I took kind of the opposite approach: I pointed my camera not at a bee but at a flower, hoping the former would come along and alight on the latter.

And by golly, as my dad would say, that’s just what happened. I had my exposure set to f/8, Auto ISO with 1/200 minimum shutter speed and I popped off a small burst of photos (continuous high-speed shooting on my D750 is something like 6 or maybe 7 frames per second, so make of that what you will) and one of them was, I am fortunate to say, just about right.

Everything about this image just works. The leaves fill the frame from top-left to bottom-right, while the flower in the center commands your attention the instant you see it. The bee is frozen in time except for its wings, which are a beautiful blur of motion as they keep it neatly positioned above its target so as to collect a bit of nourishment and pick up some pollen at the same time. The bee is sharp and in focus, its compound eye clear and unmistakable, and the angle of view draws you, the viewer, into the scene as if you were right there next to it.

I’m so happy with how this turned out, and yet still I am looking forward to what lies ahead. If I can do this once I can do it again, and who knows, maybe next time will be even better. Because in photography there’s always something new to learn, something fun to try, and some new horizons to explore if you’re willing to go for them.