I went back to the next to last day of the orchid show yesterday. It was so crowded on Saturday that we made it about a third of the way through and left. Not so bad on a weekday. It was beautifully clear, which created interesting lighting opportunities in the glass walled and ceilinged gallery.
It is striking that something as complex as an orchid can come from a simple, symmetrical bud, or, in this case, a cascade of them. It makes for nice layers.
Orchids come in an astounding variety of shapes, sizes and colors. I'm no botanist (where I grew up the ground cover was cement and asphalt) but I've never seen anything like this. A sign said it was called something like a spider orchid. I don't think of spiders as curly and pink but what do I know. Looks to me roll-up candy.
Orchids share a basic morphology but come in lots of variations. The range at the Botanical Garden's annual show is bewildering. There is an equally wide variety of ways to photograph them. One approach is a trio with shallow depth of field.
A similarly shaped orchid with a different color scheme. I bumped up the saturation and contrast to see what would happen.
I don't know much about orchids other than that they are epiphytes and sometimes look, um, provocative. This looks like the same variety of flower as in yesterday's post, but with shoots and buds that I assume will become new blossoms.
Time for a change. The annual orchid show is nearing the end of its February run at the Missouri Botanical Garden. We wanted to get there in time but, on a clear winter Saturday, it was so crowded as to be unmanageable. The lumbar facet joints were complaining loudly so we got a third of the way through and decided to come back on a weekday - one of the benefits of being old. Still, got some decent images.
