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Rainbow Cactus

The Rainbow Cactus is one of my favorite cacti. It gets it’s name for it’s colorful bands of spines. Some Rainbow Cacti, however, do not have them so they are best identified by their flowers. We spotted this Rainbow Cactus with it’s twin flowers along the Herman’s Peak Road, north of the town of Terlingua, TX. We pulled over and photographed it. The sun was overhead and the harsh lights required us to defuse the sunlight. This helped bring more focus on the flower and highlight the colors. I especially liked this composition as it makes it look like the flower is looking back at us. And, it reminds me of the little robot in the movie Wall-E.

Rainbow Cactus
Rainbow Cactus

This image was taken with my Canon EOS 5DS using my Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro Lens. The camera was set on Manual mode with the aperture set at f/4, shutter speed at 1/160th of a second and the ISO set at 100. I used a tripod for stability and my Kirk Focusing Rail to obtain 6 images which I brought together into one image using Photoshop and the focus stacking technique. I then finalized the image in Photoshop using Nik Color Efex Pro.

Click on the photo to enlarge it. You can find the profile for this flower by clicking here and my favorite Texas Wildflower photos by clicking here. Please use the section below to post your comments, questions or suggestions.

T. Kahler Photography
© 2017 T. Kahler Photography

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