Ginko

There is a large ginko tree next to one of the women's dorms on our campus. At this time of the year the leaves turn a blaze of yellow and it just begs to be photographed. Today the sun was bright, the temperature cool, and the sky deep cobalt. I really had very little to deliver to my photography class and when I mentoned this to a colleague in passing he suggested I take everybody out to photograph the ginko. Perfect idea. I made it an optional activity for the second half of the class. Most of them opted out and went off to use the windfall of time some other way. But a handful came out with me, enjoyed the beauty of the tree, and actually learned some things about photography they hadn't picked up before. The weather pattern this year has the tree not quite as blazing in color as it's been in past years. Some of the leaves are still a bit green and already many are falling off. But the remarkable beauty is there in a more subtle way. This is sort of a natural version of the idea of what I talked about a while back re: an artist backing off from the extreme corners of the envelope to deal more with subtlety of tone. Here are a few tastey images: