One of photography’s greatest assets, is allowing us to capture images, especially in nature, that are up close and often detail revealing.

Close-ups, can be subjects where the photographer is literally close when he/she made the photo, moderately close with a subject that is fairly large, or a more distant shot which was followed by a crop in th editing process. Although my preference was being literally close with a close-up or macro lens, I have made my share of the other kinds as well.

Literally close with a macro lens.

I had no worries of frightening my subject with these Foxtail Barley grasses with dew. However, getting close without disturbing one blade of grass, without losing the dew on all the other grass, was a challenge.

Eventually I slowly won the war.

I used a very, very, very, very slow approach with a 300mm close-up ;lens allowing me some space, rather than my 105mm macro. For this dragonfly, it was one inch at a time.

Flowers are the life’s blood of close-up, macro photography. I wore out a lot of jeans crawling around making macro shots of flowers. I loved every minute.

Behavior with “little critters” is the main course for many photographers.

Close-up photography can mean something that bigger than a macro subject, but, but a tight, close shot just the same.

Woodpecker and an orange.

Up close at the bird feeder.

Wild Badger, Colorado.
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Woodchuck

Badger

Snowy Owl

Marmot

Baby Robin,

This one was made with a long lens, and then cropped.

Never ending subjects.

Sometimes with a moderate or even a wide angle lens such as 24mm, we can use a subject up close, such as the bladed desert plant you see below, and a distant mountain, along with a with a large F stop such as F22, and display both close-up and distant subjects together and in harmony.

I hope you enjoyed your “up close” view of the natural world, and may God Bless.

As any of you who have followed this blog for a long time, I believe know, I often write about several subjects beyond photography.

Two of those subjects in which I give my opinions are, politics and religion. We all have a right to our opinions and I am quite glad that a percentage of blog readers, seem to understand that.

I have not always been a political conservative but I have been so for quite a while. My liberalism began to make me sick, and I changed teams if you will. I thank God for that. He (God) brought to the table, something called common sense.

That of course, is my opinion.

That does not mean I believe in everything that is shared by conservatives. There is false conservatism as there is false anything.

That brings to mind, my other reason I am “hated” by some. I am a Christian. Not a Sunday morning Christian, but a 24/7 one. At least, that is my goal although I do from time to time, fail. Thankfully, the Christian God is a forgiving God.

Right now, like never before in history, there is confusion as to what terms such as conservative, liberal, Christian and other religions, mean.

That is because tn my opinion, the “world, dances back and forth, apparently trying to please everybody, in and out of the truth.

I have stopped attempting to please most of the world, or really anybody, and I just tell the truth as I see it. No facades. I may be wrong, I may be right, but it is what I believe when I write it.

You cannot do what I do, or say what I say, and expect to be loved by the “world”. I fully undertand that.

So there you are. Just an average (on my best days) guy, professing what I truly believe in, and letting everything land where it falls.

So the answer is, will I keep writing this blog after I have chased so many away? Most likely yes. I’ve been around a long time and I don’t need the approval of others to say or do what I truly believe in.

Very often, being disliked means we are doing the right thing. There are many haters of the truth.

I am coming to the belief, that there is nobody left of center, in the world, that has any common sence. They range from a world of candy canes and big rubber balls, to right of center concervatives who would wipe out all who disagree. I think there is maybe 10% of what is considered conservative, that is as mentally unbalanced as is 90% of the left.

FDon’t leave me and a few others alone, to prove the values needed for simple, common sense and human decency.

Please!!!!!!!

I do not write what I write because I am brave. I certainly am not. I do so, because I believe. I have total Faith in only one thing, but that one thing (God), is everything.

You can know, that what I say, is actually what I believe. I know no other way to do this.

With that said, in my opinion, you could throw a stone in the air, and hit a better Chrisitan than I am. I will however, keep trying to be better.

So there it is, I have come right out in front of God and the world and told just who and what I am. Win or lose.

Zero bravery, just faith.

At Times in American history, almost everyhing and every belief has been explored by somebody.

The next paragraph is true.

There was a period of time, in my lifetime, when the increasing size of our population was so feared, that there were left of center Americans,who wanted older Americans, who had out lived their time, to be extinguished. The thought was, they do not produce anything or contribute,, so they should move on. To death.

In other words,they produced nothing and took too much. This same crowd who thought this were also the beilevers in abortion, in order to reduce the population.

Kill the young and the old.

There is no limit to what mankind will do to make things the way they think it should be. Rements of those people, live today. Just look at any social media site.

May God dearly Bless each of you, regardless of your politics, your age, or your current faith.

Wayne