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Farewell
With flowers we create feelings and express feelings. With flowers we want to elicit feelings. If they aren’t just a comfortable souvenir, that is not suitable for the wall or the shelf.
Their color is not enough to stimulate our emotions. It’s also their shape and a composition. I took a friend to my favorite florist to design a bouquet from the available flowers end of September. The central component were two specimens of a cockscomb, one in red and one in purple.
Celosia or cockscomb © Julian Köpke A not insignificant part of the enjoyment is the creation of the composition, together with a sensitive florist. At home I photographed the bouquet with the horizontally aligned, rectangular Lightbox in the background. It’s, of course, an HDR image, combined of shots with the Lightbox switched on and off. A final greeting of the noticeably farewell summer.
Bouquet with celiosa © Julian Köpke Farewell has always been a theme of flowers. Without color, subject only to the effect of light, exposing a feeling for the original color, the black-and-white image of a flower becomes intensified. The same day at sunset, with an exposure speed of 6 minutes at ISO 50, I obtained the following picture, which made me immediately think of The Godfather: I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse.
Rose © Julian Köpke -
Gift
It had take a long time until I had chosen a beautiful floral arrangement and d the florist had bound it presentably. I was just about to complete the purchase when I noticed a wonderful Gladiole.
„I’ll give it to you for free of charge, it has already fully blossomed“, said the owner. My thanks to her are the following pictures of this flower, which I made with my lightbox in the background.
Gladiola © Julian Köpke 
Gladiola © Julian Köpke 
Gladiola © Julian Köpke -
Last hot summer days
The last hot summer days are noticeably less hot. Autumn shows up on my rose hips, which are still fed by the water of a vase. Over the course of the days her leaf green became increasingly discolored in autumn. I don’t want to believe it.
Delicate rose hips before autumn starts © Julian Köpke -
Artichoke
Melitta was looking for an image in her new kitchen. She felt a fusion image of a fruit basket to be too dark. The fusion image technique is not restricted to black and white or monochrome (FAQ: Fusion imaging). With only few structural content in the X-ray of the fruits I better inverted the background of the image and sponsored a golden backdrop like an ancient greek icon. You still can see some X-ray properties looking at the lychees or the bananas. As a print its appearance was best.
X-ray fusion photo of lychees and fruit in a wooden bowl © Julian Köpke Also appropriate for a kitchen would also be an image of an artichoke. If I put it on a lightbox, there is always some resemblance to a copperplate print, which I like personally. This blooming artichoke is a type of a food image, if you spend some phantasy.
Blooming artichoke © Julian Köpke A little change of perspective gives more direct access to the blooms. Every image shown in this blog entry is a combination of manual HDR and software assisted HDR. That way I get best results. The background helps to create the look and feel of ageing and simulating a print.
Blooming artichoke © Julian Köpke The artichoke presented above has some resemblance to a thistle. By chance we have a place not far from home with lots of them. Old railroad tracks had been removed and converted into bike trails nearby our house. So we went this morning by bike to get a thistle of the former track bed for an image.
Blooming thistle at the former railroad tracks © Julian Köpke As there is so much structure in these images, I felt tempted to convert my artichoke and thistle images into monochrome. To some extent they resemble images of Karl Blossfeldt.
Blooming artichoke © Julian Köpke 
Blooming thistle at the former railroad tracks © Julian Köpke -
Astilbe
An Astilbe has an umbel-shaped inflorescence and therefore consists of countless small blooms. While blooming, its structure is extremely delicate and light. It looks as if spotted in the light that shines through everywhere. An Astilbe seems to be floating. What a delighting gift to get such a plant from my preferred flower dealer.
Blooming Astilbe in a vase © Julian Köpke 
Blooming Astilbe © Julian Köpke I had planned to reproduce this impression photographically. The three-dimensional impression of the human eyes is a complete different reality than a two-dimensional photograph. My photographs didn’t seem as delicate and fragile as the original.
The richness of the flower structure better unfolds in image crops. The resolution of my PhaseOne is high enough to have sufficient quality available in a cropped image.
Blooming Astilbe © Julian Köpke 
Blooming Astilbe © Julian Köpke -
Staying at home
Light is subject to permanent change. The transformations of light accompany us always. In the course of the day, we immerse ourselves in the light of various sources and their shaping unnoticed. In a photograph, too, the imperceptible shaping of light is our companion.
The light in a photograph and its impression is shaped or transformed by postproduction. The changeability of the light by postproduction helps an image to its final expression.
What light do we see in our dreams ? What light do we see when pre-visualizing an image ? What light do we see when we get the idea to a photograph ? The latter light we experience like „a flash within a long night“. It is only after the completion of the work that relaxation may take place.
Inner light in a red rose © Julian Köpke Having learned how to do focus stacking on my PhaseOne camera, I made two series of 20 macro images with a rose on a lightbox, the box switched on and off for the two series. Combining the two light situations made this image possible.
You may find more roses here.
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Sadness never ends, but luck
Tulips have become an attraction to me. For a long time I found them extremely boring and meaningless. That has changed over many years. Should I have become older because of that ?
We also have many tulips in our garden. A group of red tulips at the edge of then planted tomato bed is particularly beautiful. But is this beauty also photographicable ?
The beauty in a vase is the epitome of transience. In the meantime, changing light conditions trigger a feeling of tension and happiness in me. This bouquet of tulips has been staying with us for a week now.
Tulips © Julian Köpke With my iPhone I took a shot in our living room. Filter apps help me to get a presentable result.
Tulips imagination iPhoneography © Julian Köpke Today I wanted to try out the same light with the tulips, which spoils my eyes every day with the orchids.
As one can see, our tulips in the living room get already weaker. They are old guys now. Fresh water doesn’t really help. There is no light at the end of the tunnel. How sad is that.
Bouquet of pink tulips © Julian Köpke -
Orchids
For more than a year I observed a special light condition in our bathroom, where orchids usually lead a more or less varied life. During the last weeks new blossoms showed up. I felt a sense of a gleaming white. Would it be photographable ?
White Orchids © Julian Köpke Our lives have fundamentally changed during the last 5 weeks. There is more time now for private life. Fortunately we have a small garden to enjoy the sun. And we talk to friends in video sessions like FaceTime. But still 3 Weeks of quarantine is a challenge.
How wonderfully soft these orchids caress me in their shimmering light ! They shall accompany me through this time.
Yellow Orchid © Julian Köpke A print is different from a posted image on a website. The expression of precision and painting in some cases is created in print better through a background. I prefer a print, because a print starts a personal communication with an image.
White Orchids with background © Julian Köpke 
Yellow Orchid with a background © Julian Köpke -
Blossom ends, friendship lasts
It’s been for two weeks and two days, every day very special and filled with exciting photographic moments. Two men got closer about photography, art and life. It’s over now. We had to go home.
On a turn-out along the I5 near Lost Hills we stopped to change drivers. There we found fields of blooming almond trees with a lovely and sweet fragrance in the air. Following a verdict attributed to John Wayne („A man’s got to do what a man’s got to do“) we immediately grabbed our cameras and did what photographers have to do.
Almond trees in bud © Julian Köpke After a certain amount of time, when the almond blossom is over, Harold’s and my friendship will last and life gets even better. Provided you like almonds and you don’t have any dietary restrictions.
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Snowdrops X-ray photo
I’ve never waited for snowdrops before. Inconspicuous and boring flowers. Strength of marsh mallows. The colors of a cold green and opaque white.
From my father-in-law’s garden we just dug up some freshly flowering specimen of snowdrops, at the roots the soil of his garden, which he can no longer cultivate.
My technician and I made a mammography of it, with low Voltage and lots of photons. The whole afternoon I could breathe in the scent of these flowers while working.
Snowdrop X-ray photo © Julian Köpke
