Canon 30D, handheld Mamiya 80mm at f4 1/400 second at ISO 250

Matinee Anole

As I eased around an obscuring branch to get a peek at a shy Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis,) I found it posed in lazy summer introspection, or so it seems based upon the position of the foreleg and the eyes. It's pretty safe to say that no such emotion was going through its head, especially when it had scampered to this position due to my presence, but we humans are pretty bad about reading emotions into other species that just aren't there, based on appearances.

But shooting handheld without a flash in dimmer light, I opted for a large aperture, which brought along its friend, Short Depth of Field. The sharpness of the anole's face contrasted against the subsequent blurring of nearly everything else in the frame, with the splash of purple, provided an appealing impressionistic feel to the image, making it one of my favorites.