Day 11: Plants
Good morning Hive!
It's day 11 already, and I'm very satisfied with the photographs that I already took during this challenge. As this is a small experiment, I'm starting to see a pattern or things that are recurring. Quite interesting to see myself and expose parts of my personal life. It's not the first time that I'm opening up, but showcasing parts of my identity like this can feel a bit uncomfortable.
Never thought about how ordinary items could be having an impact when all put together. It is probably also about caring and adding emotional value to the possessions when you start thinking about them more in-depth. Maybe I'll write a summary of all the items on the 31st perhaps as @finguru suggested in my first post of this challenge.
Today is all about plants. Not sure if I end up on a trip down to oxygen land... ha, it's all part of the experiment!
Do we use plants?
Now that I think of it, plants may not be an ordinary objects that we "use", whoops. But is this true? Why do we keep plants? Why do we have the urge to have something living in our home other than ourselves? This might be that kind of "object" that has turned mundane to many of us. The truth is, plants are essential, perhaps not essential to keep them in our homes, but to keep us alive.
According to Google: "we rely on them for food, water, medicine, the air we breathe, habitat, our climate, and more". Well well well... Would you look at that? Let that sink in for a minute, and wonder why it is that we keep plants in our homes. Primal instinct perhaps?
Growth
For me, there is another reason why I keep plants. I track them to see if they have grown. I check them if their leaves are turning brown if they appear healthy etc. Whenever something is wrong with a plant, I check the soil and wonder if the air that we breathe in this house is clean enough, or if the water is a bit fucked up.
Before getting a coffee machine, where you had to check how hard the water is, I could already tell that our drinking water is pretty hard. The leaves of our plants show signs of calcification (white marks) often mistaken for blight.
It's nice to see something grow that you take care of. For example, the avocado plants that we grow from seed give a lot of joy. 'Growth' can also be an abstract subject. We grow every day. In size, in learning, in being ourselves, and in other things.
The creative process
When I was playing around with the light I noticed something which reminded me of seeing an artwork during the Focus Art Fair in Paris. It instantly inspired me, these colors are 'almost' the same that the artist uses in her paintings. Because I photographed her work and promised to send it to her, I already knew what to do in post-edit to enhance these colors. To get the red illuminated background, I used my Philips HUE lamp, set it to red, and placed a diffusing screen in front of it.
Technical details
Camera
Sony A7 MARK II
Lens
Sigma 105mm f/2.8
Shutterspeed
1"
Aperture
f/7.1
ISO
200
About the challenge
Photograph and write a little bit about 30 ordinary items that I used a lot in 2022. You can read more about the challenge, and join yourself here. This challenge is just a little experiment.
Plant a seed, and watch it grow
I like the saying "You reap what you sow", or the dutch one "meerdere pannetjes op het vuur". The more seeds you plant, the bigger the harvest. In both sayings, you have to take care of the process. Taking care of ourselves is not always a given, some find it difficult (like myself), while others care too much.
For me, everything happening around me has always been a learning curve. There is always room for growth. The plants around us, are simple reminders that we too start as saplings, and can become plants, and trees to eventually become part of a huge forest. A philosophy that is shared by one of the characters of Kärlek & Anarki, a Swedish Netflix series.
Keep on growing!
Cheers,
Ruben
That was an interesting way to capture the idea, I never would have imagined it. That red background makes a very good contrast with the green of the plant
I think we put plants in our houses as decorative objects, in the first instance, until one day we become attached to them and realise that they are living beings and that they need our attention. That's how we function. Very nice work. You have left me thinking a lot about it. The photos are great. I'll stick with black and white but I confess I feel like using colour now.
Plants. @derangedvisions makes me want to grow my own flower. I tended to roses this spring and summer, but plants are meditations. This whole thing is- life, gaming, photography. The process ought to be the fun part. I forget that with so much going on. After this, I want to talk about books, movies and shows. Episode at a time, chapter. My day + a day in the life of something or someone else. Neat.