One photo a day challenge: Day 132.

I continue to surprise myself as I have found inspiration to try new things with my photography during this challenge.

I have always considered myself a natural light photographer. Not a lot of my photography uses light sources other than the available light outdoors or in a room if I am indoors.

Three things have led me to trying new things in my photography:

1. Having the opportunity to experiment more because I am consciously making the effort to take new photos every day.
2. I somewhat by chance decided to buy a product that I have never used before, Lume Cube lights.
3. Teaching a photography class where I am spending more time talking about photography including techniques that I do use as well as those I don’t use.

The fact that I am simply taking more photographs than ever before gives me a sense of freedom that allows me to try more experimentation.

I decided to add some Lume Cube lights to my gear collection as an extra lighting option if I couldn’t or didn’t want to use a flash. I really had no idea if or how I would actually use them. Doing this one photo a day project has given me so many opportunities to experiment with them including today.

Spending more time talking about photography allows my mind to think about and explain photography in ways that I might not normally think about them in my regular photography. Talking about different techniques and experimenting with them in class inspires me to try them more in my own photography.

Todays Photos

Today for something different I took my Lume Cube Panel Mini with me out to the edge of my woods looking to see if our Dogwood trees were blooming and looking for the tiny Fringed Polygala flowers were blooming. It was still light out but the sun was setting. Some extra light would be helpful.

As it turns out both the Dogwoods and the Fringed Polygala were in bloom. The Dogwood had many blossoms starting. There was only one Fringed Polygala currently. I used my Lume Cube light on a tripod to illuminate the subjects from different distances and different angles to see what I like best.

I have never photographed a wildflower with an external light source before. Previously have always relied on whatever natural light there was from the sun previously. This ha opened up all new possibilities for me.