Before Christmas, I had a small bunch of peonies, given to me by a friend after my shoulder surgery. I photographed them recently here and here with a cupcake.
I kept one in a small vase on my desk, and gave the rest to a friend at work. The one on my desk had dried beautifully while I was away on holidays and so I couldn’t resist photographing it. I spent a few sessions with it, but here is the first five minutes.
First, a series from afar, seeing the whole flower, with varying edits to showcase the textures, the colours, the beauty.
And then moving in closer:
I am obsessed with these “Beauty in Decay” shots. I have many more, but they weren’t within this five minutes, so I will share them another time.
I know some other people have taken pleasure from photographing the beauty in decaying flowers – the colours become richer, the textures are amazing. I love the way this peony holds much of its traditional shape.
I wanted to showcase a couple of other photographers who have shown the beauty in decay:
Su Leslie, from Zimmerbitch – Su’s work is beautiful. She is a regular RegularRandom’er and if you aren’t following her already, I highly recommend you do.
Sue Judd, from WordsVisual – a fellow scientist, with a great eye for photography.
Laura Bloomsbury from Eljaygee – a London-based photographer who posts lovely photos.
Tish Farrell from Writer on the Edge – a writer, who accompanies her words with lovely photos.
And lastly, Kiki from Through a Lay(wo)man’s Lens – I’ve only just discovered Kiki via the Reader when searching the “Beauty in Decay” tag and I’ve found that she’s done a series on the exact topic. Be sure to take a look.
I also searched the #beautyindecay hasthag on Twitter and Instagram and discovered an enormous number of posts, many related to abandoned buildings.
So, that was my first RegularRandom for 2018. If you’d like to join in, please do so! It’s lots of fun. Here’s the idea:
- choose a subject or a scene
- spend five minutes photographing it – no more!
- try to not interfere with the subject, instead see it from many angles, look through something at it, change the light that’s hitting it
- have fun!
- tag your post #regularrandom and ping back to this post
x desleyjane
Musings of a Frequent Flying Scientist 
I’d love to hear from you!