“Floral” is in quotes for a reason. The landscaping at the back of the house has been neglected, because it’s at the back of the house A little while back I noticed we had a very large thistle growing, so a couple days ago I decided I’d do something with it.

Cutting pieces off of this was very tough without gloves. But it was worth it.

I set up a little makeshift “mini studio” in my office for the shoot. This basically consisted of a black comforter pushpinned to the wall, a white piece of cardboard as a reflector, and my SB-24 twist-tied to my tripod: no, I don’t have a light stand or umbrella yet. Soon. Maybe. I hope.

I shot these with the SD14 and Vivitar 28/2.5. The close-up shots were done using some generic macro extension tubes.