Japanese Magnolia and Bud T-Shirt

This beautiful Japanese or saucer magnolia (Magnolia soulangiana) is in Hanover Township, PA, in Montgomery County. With its darker pink and white petals, it's one of the prettier ones I've seen.

I’ve been capturing images that tickle my brain ever since my parents handed me my first camera in 4th grade- a well-loved old Brownie Starflex. My “thing” is lighting—the more natural, the better. Back-lighting and worm’s-eye-views have become near-obsessions. As an art major at Goshen College years ago, the best advice I got there from a favorite professor was to “Play with it!”... sage advice which I still follow today. This may mean lying down in a ditch to see some brown-eyed Susans from below, and there’s the fun. My greatest joy in photography is its way of etching moments in my memory. That singular ray of light or fabulous color which would otherwise get forgotten becomes like an old friend when I process or view the image...