2011, Day 320 - Floor fungus

This morning, in the Oregon drizzle, I stopped in the woods to take pictures of the trees in the rain and fog.  It didn't work out as planned but as I was wandering I noticed, amongst the debris, mushrooms.  There were all kinds sprouting in the rich floor under the evergreen canopy.  Many were peeking out from moss and pine needles, partially hidden under skeletal maple leaves in the dense shady parts of the woods.

Recently I've been using small apertures to achieve a greater depth-of-field but for the mushrooms I decided to shoot closer to wide open for a number of reason that resulted not only in this shallow depth-of-field but also faster shutter speeds so I didn't have to set up a tripod.  In fact, my camera was on the ground with the left side of my face pressed into the moss to get this shot.  When I stood up my knees were sodden and I had to brush pine needles off my face.  This was the second shot, it was so dark and I wanted the rich colors that I underexposed by over a stop.  I want to take more pictures of mushrooms now but there is only so much time you can spend in the rain in wet trousers before you've exhausted your endurance.

Canon 1Ds Mark II, Canon 24/f1.4L Mark II
24mm, f1.8, 1/50 sec @ 320 ISO