Conflicted Seasons

A little bit of this and a little bit of that. Here's a little bit of summer and a little bit of autumn all in the same frame.

According to my friends, the Capital Weather Gang, my neighborhood should be in peak autumn color by the end of October. I'm thinking it might be a little sooner than that, so I'm going to be keeping my camera close at hand.

When the foliage flares into color, I'm going to be ready.

I'm Back

Hello again! I know. It's been awhile. I took a break from blogging recently not because I ran out of things to say, but ran out of the energy to say them. In spite of that, I've missed sharing with you. I have been touched by those daily demands for a return of my photo posts (thanks Mom). Since I need to make up for lost time, I will try to post several photos each day to make up for missed days. Hopefully if all goes as planned, this interruption is only that and won't be repeated any time soon.

To start off the make-up period, today's post is a close-up photograph of a flower growing in a neighbor's front yard. One day on my way home from work, I decided to photograph it. I was dressed in office attire and high heels, squatting in the road to take this photograph. Let's just say that the passing cars received quite a view. This striking flower proves that beauty can grow anywhere, even in your neighbor's yard.

Translucent Leaves

Have you ever seen the Pixar movie, A Bug's Life? Even though I've loved all of the Pixar movies and short films, A Bug's Life still remains my favorite. It was not as popular as the Toy Story films, Up or Wall-E, but I loved its humor and inventiveness, especially the creativity behind the world designed for these bugs.

To accurately create the ants' environment, Pixar designers developed a very small video camera and ran it along the ground, like an ant, in the grass outside their offices. Their footage showed them that from an ant's vantage point, leaves appear translucent like the ones I photographed in Georgetown this summer. Instead of a leaf appearing as solid, the sunlight from above filters through the leaves and gives them this transparent appearance.