Spring Bloom Photography: Playing With Textures

Today marked the first day of Spring and that means some of the year’s best weather. Good bye cold Winter months. Hello, beautiful and mild Las Vegas sunshine! Our desert Summers can be scorchers, but the few weeks of Spring are true beauties. The perfect time for photography tutorials that inspire you to capture Spring Bloom Photography!

More sun also means the blooming of colors and fragrances that has laid dormant. We moved into our new home and these Spring blooms arrived at the onset of warmer weather. I was so happy that I took out my camera to document the very first flower buds of OUR home.

While shooting the pretty little white flowers of my plum tree, I dropped my aperture as low as it could go {1.8 in my case} and manually chose my auto focus points in order to compose exactly the image I desired, also being very conscience of my light source {an early rising sun}. I was able to create some beautiful bokeh while focusing sharply on my desired point.

It was fun to be outdoors again, with camera in hand, after the cold Winter months. Other than the wretched kit lens, I only shoot with a 50mm and that is not easy to do indoors. Talk about tight! But without four walls to constrain you, my nifty fifty is plenty perfect!

Since having some intense episodes of braxton hicks contractions, I’ve been spending Alina’s long afternoon nap planted firmly on my couch. Those things can get pretty intense, and since rest tends to help, I figure I’m allowed some couch time.

During today’s couch time, I finally edited my gorgeous bloom shots and was inspired to use the free textures I had downloaded from Flikr many months ago. Even if it took some time, I think they turned out awesome! The first image in this post is mildly edited {sharpening, color corrections, etc} and very beautiful in its simplicity. I love how the light is delicately embracing each bloom, yet the buds so sharp. But it was fun to get uber creative with textures and color blending. I really need to find more uses for these awesome tools!

It was my plan to use a few images of our garden around our home in lieu of expensive art. I think it gives a more personal feel {and a less painful one on our wallet!}. Some of these images may make the cut. Which ones, I’m not to sure! Let me know if you have a favorite!

There are so many photography tutorials online on how to use textures in Photoshop; don’t let them scare you away! It really opens up a huge arena of creative possibilities. You can also find a beautiful selection of free textures from Flikr and elsewhere. Just use our friend Google!

This Spring is already looking so bright and full of life… my lone plum tree has survived malnourishment and harsh conditions. She is blooming and beautiful; I feel so lucky to have captured her revival. And in a few short weeks, Spring will also bring my beautiful son {of which you will likely see plenty of pictures of too!}. What goodness to come!

Happy Spring! And happy Tuesday!