The closer you look

Oriental Poppy, Papaver orientale. Nikon D5200 Tokina 100mm f5.6 1/250 ISO 100, 6 image focus stack
The closer you look, the more you see.

It’s the time of year when photographers are scraping the barrel. I popped down the garden to see what I could snaffle and found these two mouldy Oriental Poppy seed capsules. They looked black and pretty horrible but they were an interesting shape. Up close and under the influence of my patent X-ray Diffraction Argon Laser Quantum Diffuser they came to life and I was taken with their subtle beauty.

It’s been so mild we still have several roses in bloom. SWMBO had a pink rosebud in a vase, so rather then throw these away I popped them in with it. Got a right earful.

I think I prefer the simpler composition above to this one. 

Word of warning! The amount of seed these things shed is unbelievable. I was well aware of that and spent a couple of minutes knocking all the loose seeds out of them before I brought them indoors. Wrong. Still got bloody poppy seeds everywhere.