On Wednesday morning this week, I went with my friend, Ernie Sears, to photograph trilliums at Thompson Wildlife Management Area near Front Royal, Virginia. Ernie had heard Thompson WMA was a good place to see and photograph trilliums, but we had never been there and were not sure where to look for them. Trilliums are perennial flowering plants found growing wild in forests at higher elevations from Canada to Georgia.
The rarer of two species of trillium found in northern Virginia is the large-flowered trillium (T. grandiflorum). They carpet the forest floor in April and May in certain locations. Large-flowered trillium flowers start out white and turn pink before dying. The name trillium is derived from the Latin word “tres” because the flower’s parts are in groups of three.
We parked in the second parking area, got our cameras and tripods, went to the kiosk and looked at the park map, and then entered the trail. As soon as we were on the trail, we saw the trilliums. They were everywhere and in full bloom. Our timing was perfect, because the trilliums do not bloom for long.
I photographed the trilliums using a Nikon 105mm macro lens on a Nikon D810 camera body. I shot three to four images of each flower, focusing on the center and each of the flower’s petals. When processing the images, I blended the three to four images together to get a sharp focus on the entire flower. This process is called focus stacking.
This was a short article, because I wanted to share the trillium images and get back to preparing for my trip to Iceland. My next blog article will be about Iceland and contain some of the images I shoot while there. I am expecting to see and photograph many amazing and unusual landscapes while in Iceland.
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