Amaryllis

Well, this surely counts as "still" life since the blossoming is like waiting for paint to dry. At this point there are two 15" tall stalks. The one in the front will have four blooms when it finally opens. I suspect the fact that there is a second stalk is contributing to the slow progress - maybe I should have chopped the second stalk off weeks ago?

Try some miracle grow (plant food)?, but don’t forget to check twice a day or you might miss them opening 👍

There are some really spectacular colors and size.  Most of them will grow a second stalk of flowers.  I think commercial growers must select for plants with 4 flowers per stalk.

I have grown some from seed and they have from 4 to 6 flowers per stalk.

The other thing I learned from growing seed is that they do not like growing next to each other.  The bulbs you buy are clones of one plant.  It you grow from seed or have more than one color, do not put them near each other.  They will stunt the growth of each other.

I got flowers in just one year growing from seed but only in pots that did not have competition from other seedlings.

This year the bulb needed to be planted. Last year the bulb was coated in wax and it seemed to grow like crazy. Last year there was only one stalk out of the bulb. I suspect the four blooms will be fully open by Saturday or Sunday. I suppose I'm concerned that both of this year's stalks are 15" tall. This is a sequence of last year:

...10" over the tips of the horizontal blooms.

19" from the bulb to the top of the bloom opening on the rear stalk.

This guy is kinda crazy compared to last year.

I have never seen a bulb coated in wax.  It would flower the first year because the flower is already in the bulb.

Great composition and colors.

But now I'm hearing Falco singing:

Amaryllis, Amaryllis, Amaryllis

Amaryllis, Amaryllis, Amaryllis

Amaryllis, Amaryllis, oh, oh, oh Amaryllis

Come and rock me, Amaryllis

Did he ever do anything else? Would that song have broken through without MTV? And how can I possibly twist this to have any relevance to photography?

...maybe he is mentioned in the great PBS limited series ICONS Through the Lens which I've been watching for the last week or so (streaming).

grsnovi wrote:

Well, this surely counts as "still" life since the blossoming is like waiting for paint to dry. At this point there are two 15" tall stalks. The one in the front will have four blooms when it finally opens. I suspect the fact that there is a second stalk is contributing to the slow progress - maybe I should have chopped the second stalk off weeks ago?

These are always spectacular.

Don't chop anything off, such a pity! A somewhat higher temperature will speed them up.

Thanks Jaap! The two larger blooms opened last night. I'll probably set up the macro rail this afternoon and shoot the stamen.

Not real happy with this stack of 15. Seems that more of the pollen should be sharp. Also there seemed to be halos around some of the larger stamen heads (cropped out of this view). Stacked in Affinity Photo 2.

The 2 large blooms opened last night.

The whole thing as of today.

Just the main bloom.

I never seem to get pollen looking like i think it should either (despite taking multiple stacks and messing with lighting)

stacking can be hit & miss, I think a camera that does it internally would be useful so i can see results immediately (and then adjust and try again)

Jim

jim mij wrote:

I never seem to get pollen looking like i think it should either (despite taking multiple stacks and messing with lighting)

stacking can be hit & miss, I think a camera that does it internally would be useful so i can see results immediately (and then adjust and try again)

Hi Jim,

My 2 Lumix bodies will stack internally but (so far) my limited testing of their capabilities with the 30/2.8 Macro suggest that manually stacking from the APS-C Sony with the 100/2.8 Macro yields better results.

I was using the focus rail and had focus peaking set to the color red. Maybe I should use another color against a red flower? I thought I walked the focus peaking back in depth in tiny increments - maybe not small enough?

- Gary

grsnovi wrote:

jim mij wrote:

I never seem to get pollen looking like i think it should either (despite taking multiple stacks and messing with lighting)

stacking can be hit & miss, I think a camera that does it internally would be useful so i can see results immediately (and then adjust and try again)

Hi Jim,

My 2 Lumix bodies will stack internally but (so far) my limited testing of their capabilities with the 30/2.8 Macro suggest that manually stacking from the APS-C Sony with the 100/2.8 Macro yields better results.

hi, I don’t think I’m surprised, I found helicon a bit better than canon dpp, so I assume if my canon camera did internal stacks it’d be a tad worse too, however I sure it’d give a guide, and then you could use the actual photos in a software based stack later

I was using the focus rail and had focus peaking set to the color red. Maybe I should use another color against a red flower? I thought I walked the focus peaking back in depth in tiny increments - maybe not small enough?

it’s a black art for the patient, I’d try smaller and also larger, and then manually clone and stamp all the best bits, something for a rainy day perhaps ?

- Gary

Jim,

I usually post-process the raw's and then stack the results. This time I just stacked the jpg's. When I was done I tossed everything except the result.

I probably should have kept the raw's.

- Gary