Nature posts

Film studios spend millions of dollars to create stunning epic masterpieces like The Lord of the Rings. But sometimes visual perfection can be created on a shoestring — that is, when enough time, energy and sacrifice are the alternate currency.

British photographer Kirsty Mitchell has done just that, creating a fantastical, fairytale-esque series of photos that were inspired by her late mother. A former teacher and avid storyteller, Kirsty’s mother...

Since the very earliest illuminated manuscripts, dating back to the 5th century AD, we’ve associated flora with enlarged type. Perhaps it’s something to do with the way plants repeat the same shapes, echoed by type. Or perhaps it’s simply that we can bend an organic shape to our design without compromising its integrity.

Whatever the reason, botanic forms play a...

The Rorschach test is the most widely used projective psychological test, designed to assess and identify personality structures. But while photographer Traci Griffin’s brilliant new series titled “Mirrors” bears some resemblance to an inkblot test, her aim is entirely different — namely, to show that exact symmetry cannot be found in nature.

Starting from this vantage point, Griffin spent nearly four years photographing branches, trees, fields, and even human hair to create these haunting images. By photographing...

While these stunning images may look like still shots from a J.R.R. Tolkien adaptation, they’re actually the handiwork of “amateur” French photographer David Keochkerian. David’s style of infrared photography is achieved by using a special camera or lens filter to block out all light but the infrared waves. The result is an other-worldly effect where the color is strange and piercing and the quality is celestial and dreamlike.

By taking advantage of nature’s inherent beauty — from trees in bloom to a pond’s reflective properties — vivid...

In our technologically driven society, it’s tempting to exclusively draw inspiration from electronic sources. A creative block hits and soon you’re surfing the web, checking out Pinterest, clicking from site to site—determined that a screen full of pixels holds the magic key.

But maybe, from time to time, inspiration...

Artists can do a lot with a blank canvas. But UK-based Ed Fairburn demonstrates that a canvas with lines, words, and markers works just as well—or maybe even better.

Take for instance the figurative work Fairburn produced on Bartholomew maps, where a series of portraits utilize the maps’ features to produce a stunning finished product. Out of the chaos of the maps’ topography, large-scale portraits emerge with unparalleled depth and complexity—the more you look, the more you see.

Explaining his process, Fairburn says, “I study both...

It’s Friday! Across the globe millions of workers will celebrate the end of a hard week and the arrival of the weekend with a quiet drink, or a few noisy ones. 

Whether your preferred tipple is beer, wine, or a cocktail, there’s a chance that Michael Davidson and BevShots have taken a picture of it at a microscopic level.

The resulting colors and patterns produced are truly breathtaking, reminiscent of both tie dye and fractal images.

To take the photos, various alcohols are crystallized on slides and then photographed under a polarized...

Nature has always been a source of inspiration for designers to look at things differently.

We all know that a tree doesn’t always have green leaves, water is not blue and clouds are certainly not always white and puffy. As designers, we need to know to look beyond the obvious when looking at things.

Cloud formations such as mammatus or lenticular among others, are perfect examples of how intricate and different nature can be. There are even so called ‘ufo clouds’, which truly resemble the shape of a UFO.

In this post, we take a look at some amazing photographs of the weirdest cloud formations that you’ll...

Many great designers derive their inspiration from nature, and we can find tons of examples showcasing this type of inspiration online.

Looking at the world we live in and finding a way to integrate it into a design requires seeing nature from a new and very different perspective.

Here are 17 great techniques for creating original, beautiful, nature-inspired design.

If...