Faded Magnolia
Our flowering white magnolia is blooming. Every year this process is touch and go. This magnolia flowers very early. Often as not, it gets frosted. It seems to want to bloom about one warm spell sooner than it ought. And, like many flowering trees, it seems to be at its peak alternate years. In thirteen years of living here, I would say that it has fully flowered and avoided frost for a full blooming session maybe three times or so. This year it’s doing well, though a hail storm beat up some of the blossoms. The forecast looks good for finishing the bloom before the next chance of weather in the 30s about a week from now.
The tree is gorgeous in full sunlight. I waited all day for the skies to clear, but no dice. This evening I finally gave up and went out with whatever I had. I tried a different angle, approaching from behind the blooms, shooting toward the only patch of clear sky. I lit it with the on-camera flash set for -1.0 stops as a fill-in flash.
I hope the sky clears tomorrow so that I can have another chance to capture this tree before the short blooming season ends.
The camera was the Nikon D90. The telephoto was the indomitable Nikon 18-55mm AF-S VR DX. ISO 100, 1/60 sec, f/5.6 55mm. I used the Faded Glory by SEIM preset, plus a 1.5 exposure adjustment. Shooting in RAW gives a lot of flexibility for exposure.
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