Daisy Dreams

(Register for my water droplet refraction workshops to learn how to make images like this! www.donkom.ca/product/macro-photography-workshops/ )

This is the seed of a Gebera Daisy placed in a bowl of water with a fresh Gerbera Daisy placed in the background. The seed is just floating on the surface of the water, which makes it quite difficult to get the droplets in place and the seed in the right spot.

To cover this seed in droplets, I’m aiming high above the scene and letting tiny water droplets fall down to the seed with very little directional momentum except down. This allows for the seed to stay relatively in the same position while the droplets slowly grow all over it. If it does move too close to the edge of the bowl or the half-submerged flower, I very gently tap it back into place with my finger. You get a lot of water everywhere when doing these experiments, so that just enough of it ends up in the right place!

I shot this with a longer lens, the Canon 180mm F/3.5L Macro which worked wonders. The longer distance was helpful to get the camera right to the edge of the water to see a strong reflection, something that would be made more difficult with a shorter lens – though I’ve done similar shots with 100m, I have less risk of getting the lens waterlogged when working at 180mm!

The seed itself is in shadow, with a piece of cardboard positioned just out of the frame. This allows the background to be brighter than the foreground, and for the droplets to glow brighter than the surface they are attached to. There are a lot of puzzle pieces here, but when they all come together you can make a magical image! This is a single shot, no focus stacking required.