Stand Tall and Take a Bow!

[best appreciated at full size against black]

Here is another wonderful find from a photo walk in our lower forest a month or so ago. I was busy taking pictures of yesterday's tiny mushroom when I looked down and saw a cap peeking out from under some oak leaves. With a gasp of delight, I carefully lifted the oak leaf off and saw, to my amazement, not one, but TWO mushrooms huddled under the leaves! With the care of a surgeon, I slowly removed leaf after leaf, pulling away dead plant matter, twigs and small branches so that I had a nice view of the pair. If you are new to photographing natural subjects, this is called "dressing the scene," and will help to make your subject shine and make your post-processing work much easier, if you enjoy working on your photos like I do! :) To give you an idea of the clean up I did for this image, these mushrooms were completely covered with leaves up to their caps, and surrounded by more of the same. I also needed to clear away enough detritus to make room for my camera! After I finished taking pictures, I then carefully replaced everything as it was, and when I left, the only thing you could see of these mushrooms were the tops of their caps!

This image was taken in February, 2012.