'I didn't bring a tripod. Big mistake.' Second attempt at low-light plant portrait lands young photographer prestigious award
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.
Jacob J Watson-Howland might only be 20 years old, but his painterly image of a snowdrop, Streetlit Snowdrop, beat over 13,000 entries to win the Botanical Britain category in the prestigious British Wildlife Photography Awards [BWPA].
The young wildlife photographer has already amassed a formidable following on Instagram, but admits: 'Flowers aren't usually my subject of choice, so for it [the image] to be named the best botanical photo of 2025 in Britain is beyond exciting!'
The image was captured at a snowdrop hotspot near Chilham, Kent, in the UK. Jacob explains that he visits the location every winter, but usually photographs the snowdrops during the day. This time, he decided to change things up and descended upon the location with his Canon EOS R6, after dark.
Jacob used his trusty Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM | C to frame the shot, but the low-light conditions proved challenging. He told me: 'On the first night, I didn't bring a tripod. Big mistake. Without a tripod, there was too much camera shake'.
Do you have an image that should be Photo of the Day? Send your image to: digitalcameraworld@futurenet.com for the chance to be featured.
A hint of motion blur is what gives this striking image its painterly aesthetic, but this created another challenge. 'There was a slight breeze, and I knew I wanted to capture some motion', says Jacob.
'Enough to show that there was wind, but not too much, otherwise the flower would lose its shape and would be too blurry. After a few attempts and changes of shutter speed, I got the shot I had visualized.'
The photograph was edited in Adobe Lightroom Classic, but a single editing tool could have changed the outcome entirely. 'I don't shy away from removing distracting tension points in my frames, but using the cloning tool to remove distracting snowdrops in the background almost cost me', explains Jacob.
It turns out that removal tools are prohibited, save for dust-spot / dirt removal, when entering the BWPA. Thankfully, Jacob was able to come up with a workaround that provided similar results, without any cloning whatsoever. 'I used the brush tool to underexpose the distractions to create the minimalist composition I visualized', he says.
"using the cloning tool to remove distracting snowdrops in the background almost cost me..."
So, is there anything this promising young wildlife photographer would do differently, despite the image's success?
'You can always improve your images, regardless of whether it wins an award. To improve, I'd love to get a shot with a starry night sky background, rather than a clean all-black backdrop. That'll be my next step!'
Jacob's first tip is to 'Visualize the image in your mind, before you go out with your camera.' He says, 'This will increase your chances of making standout images.' And of course, don't forget to bring your tripod! 'This ensures you can lower the shutter speed to let in enough light, while avoiding camera shake. Your images will be sharper.'
Finally, Jacob recommends that you, 'Use editing software to your advantage. Don't stop yourself from using software to help create the image you envisioned. Especially if you see yourself as a fine-art photographer like I do.
'There's no harm in using software to remove anything that distracts from the main subject and narrative of your work.' But he, of course, warns: 'Be sure to check competition guidelines before submitting images'.
To see more of Jacob's work and to pick up more of his top tips, visit his website.
Check out previous Photo of the Day images, and the stories behind them. If you have an image you'd like us to consider for Photo of the Day, email it to us at digitalcameraworld@futurenet.com
If you're interested in photographing plant portraits, you can shoot stunning fine art plant portraits in your garden. And if you're a Canon photographer, check out the best Canon camera and the best Canon telephoto lenses.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
9 hours ago
- Yahoo
Does the color purple really exist?
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. The world is awash with the color purple — lavender flowers, amethyst gemstones, plums, eggplants and purple emperor butterflies. But if you look closely at the visible-light portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, you'll notice that purple (which is different from bluish hues of violet and indigo) is absent. That's because purple may be made up by our brains; It exists only because of how the brain processes color. So does that mean purple doesn't really exist? Not necessarily. The answer lies within the mind-boggling way that our brains perceive and combine different wavelengths on the visible light spectrum. "I would actually say that none of color actually exists," said Zab Johnson, an executive director and senior fellow at the Wharton Neuroscience Initiative at the University of Pennsylvania. "It's all the process of our neural machinery, and that's sort of both the beauty and the complexity of it all at the same time." Sign up for our newsletter Sign up for our weekly Life's Little Mysteries newsletter to get the latest mysteries before they appear online. All color begins with light. When radiation from the sun hits Earth, a range of wavelengths are present. There are long wavelengths, like infrared rays and radio waves, and shorter, high-energy wavelengths, like X-rays and ultraviolet rays, which are damaging to our bodies, Johnson told Live Science. Toward the middle of the electromagnetic spectrum lies visible light — the light our brains can see — which represents only about 0.0035% of the electromagnetic spectrum. This is what we perceive as the colors of the rainbow. On one end of the spectrum are longer wavelengths, which we perceive as red, and on the other are shorter wavelengths, which we perceive as indigo and violet. Our perception of color involves specialized receptors at the back of our eyeballs, called cones, that detect visible light. Human eyes have three types of cones: long wave, mid wave and short wave. Each is sensitive to particular wavelengths. Long-wavelength cones take in information on reddish light, mid-wavelength cones specialize in green, and short-wavelength cones detect blue. Related: What color is the universe? When light hits our eyeballs, these three receptors take in information about the light and their respective wavelengths and send electrical signals to the brain. The brain then takes that information and makes an average deduction of what it's seeing. "Our machinery is sort of doing this complex sort of calculation of these three different ratios all the time," which forms our perception of color, Johnson said. For example, if long-wavelength and mid-wavelength cones are triggered, the brain infers that we're seeing orange or yellow. If mid-wavelength and short-wavelength cones are activated, the brain will make a conclusion of teal. So what about purple? When short-wavelength (blue) and long-wavelength (red) cones are stimulated, your brain "makes something that's actually not out there in the world," Johnson said. Red and blue are on opposite ends of the visible spectrum: When the brain encounters these wavelengths, it ends up bending this linear visible spectrum into a circle. In other words, it brings red and blue together to make purple and magenta, even though that's not what light is really doing. As a result, purple and magenta are known as "nonspectral" colors, because they don't really exist as actual electromagnetic radiation. Nonspectral colors like purple are made of two wavelengths of light. In contrast, spectral colors — red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and, importantly, violet and indigo — are made of just one wavelength. RELATED MYSTERIES —Why is the sky blue? —Why do we see colors that aren't there? —What would colors look like on other planets? Regardless of its physical existence, purple has captivated people for millennia, noted Narayan Khandekar, director of the Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies at Harvard Art Museums. For example, ancient Phoenicians ground up sea snails to make a color known as Tyrian purple, which was reserved for royal or ceremonial robes. Today, purple is still often associated with wealth, power and even magic. "So that connection still exists, even though there are other versions of purple available now," he told Live Science. So, whether manufactured in our minds or made from ground-up shellfish, purple is unique and deserves closer look. "It doesn't really exist in nature. And so when you can create it, it has this extra value," Johnson said. "Now purple is even more special."
Yahoo
14 hours ago
- Yahoo
'Completely new and totally unexpected finding': Iron deficiency in pregnancy can cause 'male' mice to develop female organs
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Iron deficiency during pregnancy can cause a male mouse embryo to develop female features, a new study reveals. The low iron disrupts the activation of a key gene that spurs the development of male sex organs. This causes embryos with XY chromosomes — the most common combination seen in males — to develop female sex organs instead. "This is a completely new and totally unexpected finding," study co-author Peter Koopman, a professor emeritus of developmental biology at the University of Queensland in Australia, told Live Science. "It's never been shown before that iron can flip such an important developmental switch." Earlier research established that the SRY gene on the Y chromosome is the "master switch" for turning on the development of male organs in mammals. An enzyme called JMJD1A plays an important role in flipping this master switch, and it requires iron to function properly. However, the connection between iron levels and sex determination was not fully understood. Now, in a study published June 4 in the journal Nature, researchers report that iron is essential for the development of testes in XY mice. The results show that maternal iron deficiency disrupts the activity of JMJD1A, which lowers SRY expression and drives the development of ovaries in XY mouse embryos. However, it's too early to say whether this finding in mice might translate to human pregnancy and sex development, Tony Gamble, an associate professor of biological sciences at Marquette University in Milwaukee who wasn't involved in the study, told Live Science. Related: Is there really a difference between male and female brains? Emerging science is revealing the answer. In the study, the researchers used pharmaceutical treatments and low-iron diets to manipulate the iron levels in pregnant mice. When the pregnant mice experienced iron deficiency, this caused six out of 39 total XY embryos to develop ovaries instead of testes. Investigating further, they found that genetics appear to be a factor in which embryos are sensitive to this effect. To confirm this mechanism, the team also grew embryonic gonads — structures that develop into testes or ovaries in the womb — in lab dishes so they could directly observe the impact of iron depletion. These lab analyses showed that reducing the iron in cells to 40% of normal levels led to a large increase in histones on the SRY gene. Histones are proteins that bind DNA and help control which genes are switched on, and this effect almost completely blocked the SRY gene's expression. Normally, the JMJD1A enzyme rids the SRY gene of histones, allowing it to turn on. The researchers hypothesize that when iron levels drop, the enzyme's activity is compromised, so suppressive histones build up on the SRY gene. These results suggest that "some important developmental traits that were previously thought to be purely genetically controlled can also be seriously impacted by nutrition and metabolic factors," Koopman said. And "if iron can have such an impact on sex development, then maybe other organ systems may also critically depend on iron or other dietary factors in a similar way," he added. Because the research was conducted solely in mice, the question of whether iron may have similar effects in humans is still open. Although sex determination follows a broadly similar blueprint across mammals, there are some important differences between mice and humans, Gamble said. RELATED STORIES —Scientists made mice with Y chromosomes female by deleting just 6 tiny molecules —One in 500 men may carry an extra sex chromosome (most without knowing it) —These bacteria trigger a sex change in wasps — scientists finally know how For example, while both species rely on the same genes to drive the development of testes, the consequences of mutations in these genes differ between the two species. Their similarities to humans make mice important models for studying development and disease, Gamble said, "but the differences urge caution in simply assuming processes are acting identically across both species." Testing the new finding in humans won't be easy, since many of the experiments possible in mice can't ethically be done in humans, Koopman said. "So, the way forward will have to involve doing biochemical, cell culture and gene expression experiments to build a body of indirect evidence that what holds true in mice is also the case in humans," he said.
Yahoo
14 hours ago
- Yahoo
June's Strawberry Moon treats skywatchers to a rare low-riding show (photos)
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. June's full 'Strawberry Moon' lit up the night sky last night, treating skywatchers to a rare once-in-a-18-year display as it rode low across the southern horizon. Skywatchers were served the lowest full moon in almost two decades, thanks in part to a quirk of orbital mechanics known to astronomers as a "major lunar standstill". This phenomenon occurs over a two-year period when the moon's tilted orbit is at its greatest inclination relative to our planet's celestial equator (which is essentially Earth's normal equator projected out into space). During a major lunar standstill, the moon can be seen rising and setting at more extreme positions on the horizon, while tracking a very high — or low — path through the night sky depending on the time of year. June's Strawberry Moon occurs close to the southern solstice for those in the southern hemisphere, which means that it's never particularly high in the sky to begin with. The major lunar standstill exacerbated this effect, making the June full moon the lowest full moon in almost two decades. This month's full Strawberry Moon was named for the brief fruit picking season that occurs around this time each year by Algonquian, according to the Old Farmer's Almanac. Read on to see the best pictures of the 2025 Strawberry Moon as captured by the global astrophotography community. As always, if you missed last night's full moon don't worry. The lunar disk will continue to appear (almost) fully lit for the next few nights, so be sure to read up on the best practices for observing and photographing the lunar surface as it transitions to a waning gibbous moon in the coming days. Space enthusiast Marwella Zhang was able to capture this detailed portrait of the Flower Moon around midnight from Bangka Island in Indonesia, while grappling with the haze caused by tropical storm Wutip. "After sunset, the sky was starting to get clear," Zhang told in an email. "I took my first shot, but the sky was still hazy. By midnight, as it had been predicted, the sky got clear, and I took the opportunity to get a better shot of the moon." New York's photography contingent also showed up in force to capture stunning compositions of the full moon framed by the iconic city skyline. Photographer Gary Hershorn was able to position himself to capture the orange orb of the Strawberry Moon hanging above the spire of the Empire State Building on the night of June 10. Hershorn also used a powerful lens to snap the moment Earth's natural satellite appeared to brush up against the famous landmark, creating a colorful scene that blends the warm reflected sunlight bouncing off the lunar surface with the glow of the city beneath. Kristin Louise Raught caught a striking view of the Strawberry Moon hanging over the ghostly form of Mt. Rainier in Washington State on June 10. "I went out to get a photo of the moon directly over Tahoma (Mt. Rainier) but I saw the ferry coming and wanted to include it in the photo," Raught told in an email. "Rather than wait for the moon to align with the mountain, I decided to instead catch the ferry at the last possible moment before it disappeared behind the building on the pier," explained Raught. "I wanted to preserve the detail in the moon, so I opted for less light in the photo overall. I was happy that the sailboat was positioned so perfectly at this moment, it adds a wonderful detail to the photo." Andrew von Rathonyi took a different approach when eyeing the moon from the town of Irondequoit, New York, choosing to frame the celestial body as it appeared to graze the top of a low-hanging cloud, illuminating its fringes with reflected sunlight. One particularly striking shot was captured by Ahsan Mohammed Ahmed Ahmed in the city of Halabja, Iraq, which featured the silhouette of a man playing the violin on a hillside, framed by the rising form of the full moon. Ismael Adnan Yaqoob was able to snap the Strawberry Moon as it rose above a ferris wheel in the Iraqi city of Duhok on the night of June 10, at which point it had moved further from the horizon, losing the orange glow of moonrise. Photographer Isla Terli was able to snap the silhouette of a passenger airliner from Turkey as it passed across the face of the full Strawberry Moon, along with the prominent craters, ejecta rays and lunar seas that mark its surface. Twitter/X user @VeronicaJoPo caught the Strawberry Moon traveling low over Ely Cathedral in the town of Little Downham, Cambridgeshire, in the UK around the full moon phase. Finally, photographer Isla Terli was able to capture this atmospheric shot of the Strawberry Moon rising over the Selimiye Mosque in the Turkish city of Edirne, soon after it had emerged from below the southeastern horizon. Remember, the Strawberry Moon will appear almost completely lit in the nights following its full moon phase, which occurred at 3:44 a.m. EDT (0744 GMT) in the early hours of June 11 for viewers in New York. Editor's Note: If you capture a picture of the Strawberry Moon and want to share your astrophotography with readers, then please send your photo(s), comments, name and location to spacephotos@
