Perspectives on Nature Photography
Yesterday afternoon the drama came more from the clouds than from the bluebonnets (Lupinus texensis), numerous though they were on an embankment of TX 130 south of Lockhart.
© 2023 Steven Schwartzman
Written by Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 4:30 PM
Posted in nature photography
Tagged with Caldwell County, clouds, drama, flowers, Texas, wildflowers
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I’ll miss the Texas bluebonnets this year. I usually try to do a road trip back there while they’re blooming. So thanks for sharing them.
Pat Bean
March 16, 2023 at 4:32 PM
Sorry you’ll miss the bluebonnets this year. We’ve been seeing scads of them as we’ve driven hundreds of miles around south-central Texas over the past week.
Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 4:56 PM
Earth and sky seem to mirror each other, in a unique way. You have presented a photographic feast over the last few days. Thank you!
Lavinia Ross
March 16, 2023 at 5:02 PM
There is a kind of mirroring going on, isn’t there? I hadn’t though about it that way, so focused was I on the drama.
Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 5:26 PM
Fabulous!
Eliza Waters
March 16, 2023 at 5:17 PM
Yes! The bluebonnets are at their peak now, and the clouds provided a great opportunity to depict the flowers in a different way.
Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 5:27 PM
Wow! That is a stunning image. I love how the slope divides the stormy blue clouds from the sea of bluebonnets.
Littlesundog
March 16, 2023 at 6:14 PM
I used the embankment to my advantage, getting low enough to have it block the view of the land and trees beyond it that would have distracted from the bluebonnets and the clouds.
Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 6:39 PM
Both appear equally dramatic to me.
Gallivanta
March 16, 2023 at 7:50 PM
I guess that makes you an equal-opportunity dramatist.
Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 9:44 PM
Indeed!
Gallivanta
March 16, 2023 at 10:19 PM
Gorgeous image!
norasphotos4u
March 16, 2023 at 8:07 PM
Good things from the sky above and the earth below.
Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 9:46 PM
Kind of a weird vibe, almost surreal but very cool.
Robert Parker
March 16, 2023 at 9:18 PM
In college I took a liking to Surrealism in art as well as literature. Some of that has stayed with me ever since.
Steve Schwartzman
March 16, 2023 at 9:50 PM
That’s a wonderful sky. Photos of bluebonnets alongside roadways can be beautiful, but they often don’t communicate just how large the flowers’ expanse often can be. It feels to me as though the ‘big sky’ helps to give a sense of ‘big flowers,’ as well.
shoreacres
March 17, 2023 at 6:40 AM
I know what you mean about the difficulty in communicating the expanse of roadside bluebonnet colonies because they’re so long relative to their width. The bluebonnets along TX 130 continued on and off for tens of miles, sometimes densely and sometimes more scattered. I like your notion of the big sky adding an enlarging element to the bluebonnet colony.
Steve Schwartzman
March 17, 2023 at 7:23 AM
Two vast pleasures to view. The sheer number of bluebonnets combined with the huge dramatic sky made a great shot. Texas has its own Big Sky.
Steve Gingold
March 17, 2023 at 8:37 AM
Montana claims to be Big Sky Country but Texas puts in a claim for that title, too. By shooting upward from the base of an embankment I was able to play up the dramatic clouds while having the slope block unwanted things on the ground farther away.
Steve Schwartzman
March 17, 2023 at 9:06 AM
Fantastic!
automatic gardener
March 17, 2023 at 8:59 AM
I’ll not gainsay that.
Steve Schwartzman
March 17, 2023 at 9:16 AM
The dramatic events in the clouds cannot overpower my admiration for the beauty of the bluebonnets in the field.
Peter Klopp
March 17, 2023 at 11:08 AM
You’re entitled to admire both. We were out hunting bluebonnets again today.
Steve Schwartzman
March 17, 2023 at 7:25 PM
Blue-gray-scape landscape escape.
Wally Jones
March 17, 2023 at 11:33 AM
Did you know that escape started out as ex-cape? The reference was to the experience of someone being pursued; the pursuer grabbed for the fleeing person but was left holding that person’s cape as the escapee pulled loose from it.
Steve Schwartzman
March 17, 2023 at 7:28 PM
I like the tension between sky and flower-filled field – it has lots of drama! I think the sky being so monochrome contrasts well with the rich colours of the fields and adds even more drama. 🙂
Ann Mackay
March 17, 2023 at 11:53 AM
I like your photographic analysis of the multiple contrasts here. I don’t recall taking a bluebonnet picture like this one before.
Steve Schwartzman
March 17, 2023 at 7:30 PM
Impressive! I have never seen such a bluebonnet scene before. Lupines are gorgeous and with a dramatic sky even better.
Dina
March 19, 2023 at 5:50 AM
Texas sure knows how to impress with its colonies of spring wildflowers. I hope you’ll get to see the show in person one of these years.
Steve Schwartzman
March 19, 2023 at 6:08 AM
Wow!! That’s beautiful!
circadianreflections
March 19, 2023 at 11:10 AM
And uncommonly dramatic here.
Steve Schwartzman
March 19, 2023 at 11:18 AM
A “Superbloom!! “
circadianreflections
March 19, 2023 at 12:00 PM
The bluebonnets have been doing well this season. We found some huge colonies of them today.
Steve Schwartzman
March 19, 2023 at 8:00 PM