Usually when I’m photographing my goal is to capture a crisp sharp photograph – with my subject perfectly still and perfectly in focus. On a recent trip to Longwood Gardens I ended up creating some photographs that were completely different.

In the Music Room at Longwood Gardens – the big tree rotated. The first photographs I took of the tree were my usual photos of a tree at Longwood Gardens – either the full tree or a detail photo of some of the decorations. But those photos just didn’t capture the magic of the rotating tree in motion. I realized that the fast shutter speeds I was using were stopping the motion and creating a static photo.

Tree in the Music Rom – Christmas at Longwood Gardens © 2014 Patty Hankins

So I decided to play with my exposures – using much longer shutter speeds than I would usually use. For the photo of the tree in yesterday’s post – I photographed at ISO 4000, f 5.6 for 1/50th of a second. For the photos in this post – I set my ISO at 100, and experimented with different apertures and shutter speeds.

I loved the images I created – they captured the beauty of the tree in motion.

The tree photographed at f/13 for 5 seconds

Music Room Tree in Motion – Longwood Gardens © 2014 Patty Hankins

And then some closeups of the tree

f/4 for 1/2 second

Music Room Tree in Motion – Longwood Gardens © 2014 Patty Hankins

f/8 for 5 seconds

Music Room Tree in Motion – Longwood Gardens © 2014 Patty Hankins

f/8 for 4 seconds

Music Room Tree in Motion – Longwood Gardens © 2014 Patty Hankins

f/8 for 2 seconds

Music Room Tree in Motion – Longwood Gardens © 2014 Patty Hankins

And finally f/10 for 2 1/2 seconds

Music Room Tree in Motion – Longwood Gardens © 2014 Patty Hankins

I think my favorite is the final photo – do you have a favorite photo from this set?

Tomorrow I’ll share my photos of the paper feathers in motion.