The fruits of Autumn

The colours of the leaves in Autumn tend to get the headlines, but autumn brings out a wide selection of?fruits. These fruits tend to have the same vivid colours of the autumn leaves but on a smaller scale. Often overlooked by photographers, they are easy to find in most locations. The key is to try and find the best and freshest examples.

Fungi are probably the most popular of the fruits of Autumn to be photographed, but require quite a lot of effort to find pristine examples. Fungi tend to deteriorate quite quickly so regular visits to a location will be required to find perfect examples to photograph. Flash may be required or the use of reflectors and aluminium foil to lighten up the dark areas underneath the main cap of the fungi. Lenses for photographing fungi can range from extreme wide angles, with their close focusing ability, all the way through to telephoto lenses with or without extension tubes, to allow you to really isolate the subject from the background.

So far the autumn leaf colours this year are not as strong as other years. Normally some cold weather is needed to encourage the change from green. I’m not sure if this year is going to be good for autumn leaf colour, some of the trees are loosing their leaves and they still look relatively green or not a very strong orange, yellow or red.? Acer trees tend to be quite vivid with the leaf colour, but so far the ones in my garden are looking subdued compared to other years. This may all change quite rapidly if the cold weather arrives, so lets hope for some frost!