My name is Maria Helena Stanke and I’m studying digital media at University West. I’m a Photoshop artist, web designer, photographer and writer with a fondness for fantasy.
This is my growing portfolio where bright colours and darkness live in harmony with Mother Nature. I believe complexity and contrasts make life a little more exciting and interesting, don’t you agree?
I’ve entered as a voluntary test pilot of a Canon EOS 550D.
It will be very exciting to see how it goes. It would indeed be very nice to test a new camera. Thanks for the tip, Ann! 
And what can be more appropriate in a post about photographing than to upload some new photos to the portfolio? It’s a lot of flowers – but okay all my pictures in the photo gallery are of plants or animals so that’s nothing new. 
Anyway, here is a compote of black currants, bleeding-heart, plum tree flowers, forget-me-nots, anemones and white strawberries. Sounds yummy, right? 
It’s rather fun to crawl around the undergrowth to see what one can find now during the spring. There are a lot of pretty things down there. 
I also had a photo session with a pied flycatcher that almost seemed to pose before the camera. Look how lovely he is!
I don’t have that many vast views to photograph around here so I usually end up crawling around the undergrowth.
This is what I found the last time I went searching for pretty things to take pictures of.
