In my April 2024 recap, I mentioned that I had made a trip to the Old Mill in North Little Rock, Arkansas. Going through my photo archive, I was surprised to find this was the first time I had visited that location since 2019, which is far too long to be sure.
When I arrived that morning a couple of weeks ago, the sky was covered with heavy clouds, and the colors I was hoping to find weren’t there. I like to time my visits to the Old Mill, when I make them, with the peak of Spring color. Unfortunately, accomplishing that is often more a function of luck for me than anything else. As luck would have it for this trip, I ended up being a week or two too late. To top it off, there were a few other people milling around as well. I wasn’t going to let that stop me from trying to find some nice photographs, though.
My plan was to walk around for a little while, refamiliarize myself with the location, and see what piqued my interest. But, almost immediately, I saw this scene and set up my gear to photograph it. Even though the colors are not as bright and vibrant as I had hoped for, I still like the fresh Spring lushness of the greenery.
I actually photographed two versions of this: this one and one with a faster shutter speed that froze the movement of the waterwheel in front of the mill. I ended up preferring this one because it captures the rotation of the waterwheel and smooths the small waterfall and the surface of the water in the small pond.
I began to slowly walk around the area when I came across this small group of trees with curving trunks and surrounded by Spring plants and flowers. My biggest challenge was the breeze that had started blowing causing the leaves to move. I used the widest aperture I felt I could use while maintaining adequate depth of field and then raised the ISO until I got what I thought would be a sufficient shutter speed that would freeze any movement in the leaves. The last part of the equation was timing the press of the shutter button with a lag in the breeze. In the end, I think I was able to accomplish the task.
As I was preparing to move on, I spotted another scene somewhat hidden behind the outer line of plants and shaded by the hillside behind it. Looking at it reminded me of something one might discover in the deep shadows of a rainforest where they stood in a sliver of light allowed in by a break in the overhead tree canopy. I don’t know what kind of flowers these are (if anyone knows, let me know in the comments), but I liked the way their colors contrasted with the dark green leaves all around them.
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