Grasses can be particularly hard to photograph on drab days. They are difficult at all times because they blend into gardens and have no strong color. When flowering, and with good backlight, they can be made to harvest the light and glow in a photograph, but often they just disappear.
Searching for grasses in East Coast meadows, I visited to the native flora section of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. July is a little early for most of the summer grasses but Timothy (Phleum pratense) is a cool season grass and was in full flower. Even though it is not a native grass, it naturalizes well and the wonderful cat tail like flowering culms are quite showy for a garden meadow.
The light was flat and overcast which is often great for garden photos, but to make the grass stand out I needed to find a way to create some contrast. In this case I used the bright yellow flowers of the Licorice Goldenrod (Solidago odora) as a backdrop.
On a bright sunny day this would not work at all, the yellow would be much too bright, but on this day it was an opportunity to make the Timothy stand tall and be noticed.
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