Anthers of red Azalea

[rjlittlefield]

A closer crop of the image above.



The red azaleas in front of my house are in full bloom today.

The anthers of flowers in family Ericaceae always interest me. They form pores at the tips, and the pollen comes out of the pores.

It looks in this picture like the pollen has been caught falling out of the pores. In a sense it has, but the falling is very slow motion. The pollen is slightly sticky, and assemblies like you see here will remain almost unchanged for hours. Some of the pollen grains appear completely separated from the main mass. It is an illusion -- there is just a little bit of sticky stuff joining them.

Hope you enjoy!

--Rik

Technical: Canon 300D camera, Olympus 38 mm f/2.8 bellows macro lens at f/4, magnification 3.4X onto the sensor, ISO 100, 1.6 seconds exposure, dual-fiber halogen illumination at very low power, no diffusion, custom white balance from a white card. 52 frames at 0.002" focus step, Zerene Stacker DMap with slight retouching from PMax.

[AndrewC]

I like the image but I'm not totally convinced about the grouping. A single anther, or a group of two + one, would be more pleasing to my eye.

More importantly it has given me the motivation to go out and work on something similar which, to me at least, is a major reason for being a member of forums like these

Andrew

[rjlittlefield]