Day 105: Poppies

Finally, a poppy photo that worked! I must have taken a couple of dozen California poppy photos over the last few weeks, and haven't been happy with any of them. I've found that it's very hard to get the open poppies to look good, whether edge-on or face-on, and in bright sunshine the orangey-yellow saturates the red channel on the camera very easily so the colours just don't look right.

I tried a few test shots on a dull day when the poppies were furled up, and decided I liked that view better the fully open flowers. Although today was bright and sunny, I was able to find one lone poppy that was yet to unfurl, and with some experimentation I managed to get the exposure about right - not too over-exposed - and it took only a little bit of fiddling to get the colour right. Now I can leave them alone :-)

California poppy