View album here.
The Jacaranda brings back so many memories during the purple season in Zimbabwe. Growing up, they always said you better be ready for exams by the time the Jacaranda is in full bloom.
#FeesMustFall protests broke out again this year and after 3 weeks of sitting and doing nothing, I decided to visit home for a bit since I was not going to have another chance to do so anytime soon. As we were descending and approaching Harare, I saw purple spots in the farms and rural areas around the airport and this is when it hit me, I hadn’t seen a Jacaranda in full bloom since high school!
I hadn’t seen the Jacaranda in full bloom for three years!
The funny thing is, I grew up with this tree around me. It was just a normal tree that turned purple in October and it really wasn’t a big deal. On our drive home, however (that’s almost 4 hours from Harare), I just couldn’t stop admiring its beauty. It felt like it was my first time seeing this tree.
I was only in Mutare for 4 days and on my last day, I drove around Mutare to take pictures of the Jacaranda and I was just smiling like an idiot the whole time. I have seen so many albums from different people (both photographers and non-photographers) and I just had to have my own. Since I’ve been trying to improve my composition for landscape and nature photography, I challenged myself to try to be as creative as possible in my compositions. The weather conditions were great. It was overcast most of the day and light was soft with no hard shadows. Check out the pictures I took at the end of the article
Since I was driving I could take along anything I wanted. I used the following equipment for this small solo drive:
- Canon EOS 60D
- Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8-4.5 DC OS HSM
- Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II (ahh the plastic fantastic)
- Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS II
- Fotopro DIGI-3400 Tripod (fancy name for a really basic tripod)
