Ah, the aromatic joys of spring! This is the first time I have found Eastern Skunk Cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus). Fortunately, I didn't injure the leaves, which releases the unpleasant odor. I was drawn to the woods at the end of my street by yellow trout lilies in early stages of bloom (even though I didn't know what they were at the time). After photographing them, I spotted some marsh marigolds -- although they were more like lake marigolds this year, with saturated ground and too much rain leading to larger and deeper wetlands and spring ponds. Beyond the marsh marigolds were thick growths of bright green leaves, which I suspected may be skunk cabbage. I found several of the flower pods (spathe) and just had to capture some of them as well. I didn't take a polarizer with me this morning, which gave some interesting patterns in the water, just not the control over the reflections or lack thereof as I would normally have liked.
Bruce, the only thing I don't really love about this image is the "thing?" in the URC. The cabbage and the flower pod are really interesting - lots of texture and patterns to keep the eye interested without overdoing it.
Was there a reason you chose to cut off the smaller green leaf at the bottom of the frame? I'm wondering now if you had turned the camera about 1/3 to the right if you had been able to get in the plant, the cut off leaf and removed the object from that Upper corner? Might have made the comp even stronger. Still, a very cool image!
Bruce, I like this image and yet I am having a hard time getting my eye to lock in on a specific focal which seems like it should be so easy. My eye keeps wandering around the image almost circumnavigating the Skunk Cabbage rather than settling in on it.
Bruce, It reminds me of a Mike Moats look and I like it. I like how you cropped it but not sure about the cut-off leaf as Jules mentioned. Very nice details and exposure.
Here's the original frame, with the subject dead center (yawn). But this frame gave me the most latitude in deciding the final crop. Since I did NOT bring my Wellies (rubber boots, calf-high) but was instead standing in the swamp in hiking boots (didn't know I'd come upon so much water where I was going), I didn't work the scene in my normal fashion. I settled for discarding some pixels instead.
My thought with the originally posted crop was to make the pod more of the subject, while still including the interesting environment around it. This scene may lend itself better to a vert. I'll attach that later from a different frame.
Hey Bruce,
I think as you suspected that the CP filter may have helped here but I did find the subject very intriguing. I think that Jules had the right idea on the camera rotation so I tried it in PS. I rotated the canvas 2 degrees CCW and then cropped. Yeah....I had to remove the pine needle?....in the ULC.....but this seems to work for me now. Let me know your thoughts.
Swamp Thing
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