The Flower Mound, Sunset: May 2020

I saw a Facebook notification from the Flower Mound Foundation earlier this week that they were experiencing the best wildflower bloom they'd seen in years. Given that the mound is less than two miles from my house, this was something I obviously had to go see (and shoot) for myself!

I waited until an hour before sunset to get the benefit of golden hour light.  Along the trail to the top of the mound I was able to pick out nicely isolated subjects like this American Basketflower...

... this pair of Indian Blankets...

... and some Lemon Beebalm.

The closer I got to the top of the mound, the thicker the wildflowers became.  Upright Prairie Coneflowers were especially abundant.

The double-edged sword of the wildflowers getting thicker is that it also got harder to find simple compositions!

This little collection of Basketflowers and Indian Blankets had risen above their neighbors.

A challenge of shooting at The Flower Mound is the development that surrounds it on all sides.  It's difficult to get shots that don't also include the hand of man.  The solution?  Put the camera on the tripod and set it up really low.

Clouds had started rolling in right before I left for the mound, which meant there wasn't going to be much of a sunset to shoot.  But waiting patiently yielded some breaks in the clouds and some beautiful warm light.

These last three shots are all HDR merges of three images each two f-stops apart -- so one over-exposed, one under-exposed, and one "just right."  That lets me get nice detail in the dark foreground and the bright sky.

I was happy with my shots, but I wanted to see what I could get with better light.  That meant a return trip for sunrise was in my future!