August 15

I felt like lying low today, so I decided to try a still life.  I found this great farm stand just a few miles from my house.  The little girl there sells flowers, so I've been a regular all week.  And just down the road from it are fresh eggs for sale!  This is my new favorite country road.  Anyway the photo started as a still life of the flowers but turned into a study in how to best let light through the vase.  I got rid of the polarizer: even though it cut the glare on the vase it also made the label fuzzy.  I ended up using a neutral density filter on the bottom half of the photo to strengthen the shape of the glass while leaving the flowers brighter.  A really weak flash on the flowers helped too.  This is the most time I've spent on a photo in a long while!  I'm not totally satisfied with it, but at some point I just had to stop retaking this photo!  f/6.3, 1/6, .6NDfilter, -3.0flash