Canadian International Tulip Festival

[Manfred M]

Here are a few so-so images I took a couple of days ago at the 65th annual International Tulip Festival that is held in Ottawa, Canada every May. The festival started after WW II, when the Dutch sent tulip bulbs to Canada as a thank you for sheltering the Dutch Royal family during the war. Over 1,000,000 bulbs were planted this year.

The festival has a photographic link as well, as one of the founders was Malak Karsh, the younger brother of the famed portrait photographer, Yousef Karsh. Malak was a well known landscape photographer.

The festival runs a few more days and ends on May 22.

I used a polarizer for all these shots to reduce the reflection from the leaves.


1.





2.





3. The white tulip with the red burst is the Canada 150 tulip and was developed to celebrate this year; Canada's 150th birthday





4. The place was quite packed even mid-week and mid-afternoon.

[lovelife65]

Very nice series Manfred.
Love #1, #3 Happy Birthday Canada

[FootLoose]

Nice set, Manfred. They look impressive in lytebox.

[Shadowman]

Very nice, I always say I'll get back later and capture the tulips but if you wait too long....well next year.

[IzzieK]

Very nice...I like the new red tulip with red burst. I don't have that in my collection...

[Manfred M]

Very nice...I like the new red tulip with red burst. I don't have that in my collection...

Looks like a limited edition release using one single Canadian (national) distributor.

http://homeathome.homehardware.ca/en...he-country.htm

[Wavelength]

They are all beautiful.....

[Rainforest]

+1 to Sharon's comment. Gosh they are sharp :-)

[bje07]

I used a polarizer for all these shots to reduce the reflection from the leaves.

Nice idea that I always forget.
The result is perfect (except on # 3 crop a tad to eliminate the metallic border in LHS).

[Manfred M]

+1 to Sharon's comment. Gosh they are sharp :-)

The first three shots were taken at f/11 to maximize the depth of field without compromising the sharpness (once one gets to a smaller aperture than f/11 there will be a bit of softening due to diffraction). I focused on one of the flowers close to the front to ensure that these are fairly sharp and then recomposed to get the framing I wanted.

The lack of reflections adds to the image looking sharp.

[Manfred M]

Nice idea that I always forget.
The result is perfect (except on # 3 crop a tad to eliminate the metallic border in LHS).

That's what happens when I post images when I should be in bed sleeping. Now fixed...