Lens ball images in the garden

Lens ball images in the garden. To me, sunflowers are an obvious target for the lens ball. The gallery below shows two images of sunflowers in the back garden. I found that I could capture the sunflower directly in the image as well as in the refraction. Trays and planters of petunias at the front of the house also made a target and one of them appears in the gallery below. To get the lens ball to the correct height I had to erect apparatus! This included the black and decker workmate, a plant pot and a towel. I also played with different focal lengths. All very worthwhile and enjoyable!

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Alternative sunflowers

Alternative sunflowers. 2020 has been a good year for sunflowers in my garden. Most of the ones I have grown have dwarf varieties, Little Leo and Teddy Bear. I could not get out to buy packets of tall sunflower seeds due to lockdown. Both varieties grow approximately three feet high. Little Leo is a classic sunflower with long yellow petals, just like the sun’s rays. Teddy bear has a pompom head. It works by starting the flowers as a fringe on the outside and working towards the centre to complete the pompom.

The weather also brought some great opportunities for photographing the sunflowers. one of my birthday presents was a lens ball. I decided to experiment with it and the sunflowers were the first subject. A lens ball is a glass sphere which can be used to capture images. The process of refraction turns the image upside down. You have to use software to correct that afterwards. Two images are attached. One showing the “Teddy bear” variety. The lens ball captures the second image. I hope you like the images of alternative sunflowers. This web page has more images of my sunflowers.

I do have some tall sunflowers, these are self-set ones!

Golden sunflowers

Golden sunflowers, purple petunias and flaming red impatiens. Delightful summer gardens. “Little Dorrit” is the variety of the dwarf sunflowers, grown from seed and placed in pots. What is unique with one of the sunflowers is the additional flowers growing through the centre of the head!

Both the petunias and impatiens (busy lizzies) were bought as tiny “plug” plants from a local nursery and grown on in flower pouches. The impatiens have done better than the petunias this year.

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