Botanical Art
April 23, 2008
Zantedeschia 'Mango'
Elizabeth asked in the comments yesterday if we had a snow shower weekend locally. Yes, a little bit on Friday and Saturday, but I didn't really notice. I had purchased a bouquet on Friday afternoon, partly for the reason that the forecast suggested a return to wintery conditions (which didn't really come to pass) so I would instead spend time inside learning how to use my off-camera flash unit. These are a couple of the results of that exercise. I've primarily categorized these photographs as "botanical art", as I've used much more digital manipulation than I normally would and don't consider these images documentarian. As to what sort of manipulation, for those interested, I greatly increased the midtones using curves on both images. In the second image, I also burned a small portion of the flower to locally decrease the exposure.
I think these calla lilies are the cultivar 'Mango'. I called the florist yesterday, and the person answering the phone thought the name was 'Margo' (a non-existent cultivar, from what I can tell), so I concluded 'Mango' instead (and somewhat confirmed by the Zantedeschia photographs on the Pacific Bulb Society Wiki). Another point of evidence is the many commercial recommendations for its use as a cut flower in a search for "Zantedeschia 'Mango' cut flower".
Certainly, one of the elements that attracted me to this particular bouquet were the orange tones (the bouquet contains orange lilies and orange gerberas, as well). The Production and Landscape Horticulture program at Massey University in New Zealand has done some research into Zantedeschia pigmentation. As you might expect from a cultivar that is mainly orange with patches of red, it is concluded that 'Mango' contains a discontinuous layer of anthocyanins on a base of carotenoids.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 9:33 AM| Comments (8)
May 16, 2007
Fruit Medley
Botany Photo of the Day will have brief written entries on weekends, holidays and my vacations from April through September. I'm on vacation today. – Daniel
Thank you to codiferous@Flickr for sharing today's photograph (original | BPotD Flickr Group Pool).
codiferous names the fruits from his autumn Washington hike in the comments accompanying the original photograph.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (4)
March 14, 2007
Hydatella australis
For the first time, Botany Photo of the Day is going to be published twice in one day. The species in this stained glass art by Dr. Ruth Stockey of the University of Alberta will be revealed at 11 AM Vancouver time, along with an accompanying second BPotD entry.
Updated at 11:00 AM Vancouver local time: This stained glass piece by Dr. Stockey artfully illustrates a staminate inflorescence of Hydatella australis in the Hydatellaceae. It is adapted from an illustration of Hydatella australis by Engler, via www.plantsystematics.org. The Hydatellaceae was recently discovered to be near the root of the evolutionary tree of flowering plants by a UBC BGCPR-led research team. Previously, it was thought to be closely related to grasses. Textbooks will need to be rewritten! The paper detailing the discovery is published in the March 15, 2007 issue of Nature. See the subsequent BPotD entry for more details.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (8)
November 14, 2006
The Art of Elisabeth Feldman
Elisabeth Feldman, aka hurleygurley@Flickr submitted today's photograph via the BPotD Flickr Group Pool (original image). While I very much appreciate viewing photographs of plants without scientific names in the Flickr group pool, it generally makes it difficult for me to use them on BPotD (I need to ID them, which takes time I often don't have). On very few occasions, though, the requirement of a scientific name can be set aside when an exceptional body of work exists and I can post under the BPotD category Botanical Art. Elisabeth's photography and digital art easily meets the criterion of an exceptional body of work.
Of Elisabeth's nearly 1400 photographs on Flickr, many have a botanical theme. If you want to concentrate on her botanical work instead of discovering them by happy circumstance while browsing through all of her photographs, Elisabeth makes it very easy – she's organized her photographs into over a hundred photo sets. My personal favourite is this one: BW & Duotone Botanica, but there are many others with a botanical theme, including: Natural Scenes - Cream of the Stream, Autumn 2006, Nature Up Close - Cream of the Stream, Jes Flowers, Natural Details, everything but the flowers, fairyland, Fungi!, Liking Lichen, Macroscapes and blossfeldt inspired - a subset.
Instead of me trying to describe her art and failing, Elisabeth's approach to photography is better described by her in her Flickr bio or her Utata bio.
Many thank yous for contributing to BPotD, Elisabeth.
Photography resource link: While browsing through Elisabeth's work, I learned she was a member of Utata, “a collective of photographers, writers, and like-minded people who share a compelling interest in the arts”. Visit the site and overdose on creativity – my first impression was that it is one of those top-tier photography sites where one can spend a lot of time learning from the quality work of others. As one example, while reading through the articles, I came across Transcending Photography, an interview with Maureen Shaughnessy, who you will recognize (if you've a good memory) as a frequent BPotD contributor, MontanaRaven@Flickr.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (8)
October 8, 2006
Fungus Diversity
After noticing her set of fungus photographs on Flickr, I have to admit to hoping that Monika (half of monika&manfred@Flickr) would submit a few for use on BPotD. Lo and behold! Monika created a mosaic of her images and (without me asking) submitted it to the BPotD group pool on Flickr (original image) Thank you again, Monika!
If you're curious as to the names of some the fungi featured in the mosaic, you'll have to visit the original image on Flickr (it would take me a long time to reproduce all the links to the original photographs!). You will note that not all of the fungi are identified – fungi can be as difficult to identify as lichens, if not more so. Spend a little bit of time on the fungus and lichen identification forum and you'll quickly learn what's necessary for sussing out the identity of a particular fungus: spore prints, substrate, mature (but not overly so) fruiting bodies, habitat and more.
Are you local to Vancouver? If so, you have access to a shortcut for IDing your fungus: the Vancouver Mycological Society is holding a mushroom show on Oct 22 from 11am to 4pm at VanDusen; in addition to visiting the displays and mushroom cooking demos, show attendees can bring in their mystery mushroom and VMS members will do their best at identifying the fungus.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 5:01 AM| Comments (3)
September 11, 2006
The Art of Christian Staebler
I'm delighted that Christian Staebler of France offered to share some of his scanner art work on BPotD. I only recall seeing something similar as a modern artwork once or twice in my life, so I think Christian's creations are quite unique and special. The first word that popped into my mind when I saw them was organic, quickly followed by medieval (as in medieval art with its skewed or flat perspectives and emphasis on symbols) and collage. Coincidentally, I was idly thinking to myself about how to flatten perspective in a photograph (thinking of “Medieval style” work) only a few days before Christian contacted me, but I can honestly say I would never have imagined solving my little mental challenge with Christian's method.
Christian has a series of these images which you can browse through on his site here. He is preparing to publish the scans in a book with one scan for each week of the year (and if you know of a publisher who might be interested, send him a note via his web site!). I also highly recommend browsing through the rest of Christian's web site (when you visit a section, use the small navigation bar at the bottom of the artwork to prompt the next piece) – plenty of photographs, drawings and illustrations. As he mentions in the introduction to the site, “The main thing here is Nature. All my works (especially my personal ones) are inhabited by Nature's richness and I hope the emotions show through the images…”
I think I should also mention that all plants and animals in his scanner work are found in his garden. Christian noted to me that he doesn't kill any animals for scanning purposes (he says the cats are killing enough) and the dead insects are found here and there.
If you are interested as to what is in the photographs, the first displays a shrew on Filipendula vulgaris (top left), Sonchus oleraceus (front in the middle), Vicia sepium (bottom left) and Centaurea scabiosa (top background). The second image contains wasps, bindweed (Convolvulus sp.?) and a conifer cone on a cultivated rose (Rosa sp.).
I, for one, hope that the book does get published someday, as I know I'll purchase one. Thank you, Christian.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 4:30 AM| Comments (9)
March 16, 2006
Asclepias speciosa
I'm on vacation, so only a short written accompaniment today. – Daniel
These two images are part of a larger series posted on Flickr by Maureen from Montana (aka MontanaRaven@Flickr). To see the whole set, visit Milkweed Mother. If you'd like to see these two images in particular, visit here and here. The images were submitted to BPotD via the BPotD Flickr Group Pool. Thanks again, Maureen (Maureen's weblog: raven's nest)!
I'm fairly certain this is Asclepias speciosa and not Asclepias syriaca – I'm basing my identification on the seed morphology and barely discernible pattern of venation on the leaves (you need to see the other photographs in the Flickr set for this information). It's very possible that I've misidentified it, though. The USDA Plants Database has more information and photographs: Asclepias speciosa.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (1)
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Botany Photo of the Day and all associated images are licensed under a Creative Commons License.
Botany Photo of the Day is a project of the UBC Botanical Garden and Centre for Plant Research, located in Vancouver, British Columbia Canada. UBC BGCPR is a department of the Faculty of Land and Food Systems within The University of British Columbia.