The Magnificent Ponderosa Pine Cone Scale

Just take a look at these PRICKLES! Handle these cones carefully or you will come away bleeding! One close look at any pine cone and you will be amazed at their individual beauty. I wanted to share images of these awesome Ponderosa pine cone scales so you can see how awesome and armored they are. Almost like turtle shells with a spike on top! :) (If you would like more information about different pine cones, and to see other pictures, Wiki has a great page here! Wikipedia: Pine Cone

If you've done any macro photography, you've learned that the depth of field is a very touchy thing with these specialized lenses. If you get very close to a subject, your dof must be high enough to get the entire area of interest in focus but no higher, because you want the area beyond to fall into blur. I kept using an aperture that was too low for this close-up to include the caps of the scales to be completely in focus. Maddening! I kept getting "near misses" or a touch of blur to ruin the image. But finally, here I've gotten the focus of the scale cap with nice bokeh beyond. Hooray!! :)