Stellaria MultimediaIn the course of thinking of botanical illustration on a white background, rather than the cardboard simulacrum of the S-weeds I have come to marvel at the variety of renderings of the same plant. And thought it would be interesting to see several of them side by side for comparison. For good reasons I settled for Stellaria media - which is so common as to be included in all works, and at the same time an illustration task with some difficulties in combining a general impression true to life with a clear rendering of the details significant for correct identification.Please scroll down for references - there will be links to further presentation. Links to those that exist can also be found in the picture |
This is the resulting assemblage of cuttings from the field handbooks - with a modification of one of my own scans snuck in. Of course the screen does not do full justice to the illustrations - I still find it helpful to see them together like this. On my screen they appear in the same scale as on the book page (I'm using a Trinitron screen: Sony Multiscan 210, with Macintosh gamma settings and a resolution of 1024 X 768 - not bad, but some of you may have better.) I have also done some more thinking with eyes and hands - hoping my hand is sincere, and my eye faithful (as required by Robert Hooke): a fresh scan of the Stellaria with the steps of image processing illustrated is here. Entrance page |
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| 1. Illustration (3,5 X 3,5 cm) by Wilhelm Eigener in H. Garms, The Natural History of Europe, Feltham, Middlesex: Paul Hamlyn (second printing 1968) 2. Illustration (3 X 5,5 cm) by Henning Anthon in I. Elvers, Vår Flora i Färg, Stockholm: Norstedts (printed 1996) 3. Illustration (4,5 X 5 cm) by Björn Ursing in his Svenska Växter, Stockholm: Nordisk Rotogravyr (printed 1945) 4. Modified version of my own scan from October 2000: aiming for a colour value similar to the other samples in the collage. Below: Stellaria media from the Flora Danica |
5. Illustration (8 X 14 cm) by Bo Mossberg in Mossberg, Stenberg & Eriksson, Den Nordiska Floran, Stockholm: Wahlström & Widstrand (seventh printing, 1997)
6. Illustration (4,5 X 6 cm) by Edgar Hahnewald in Bolin & von Post, Floran i Färg, Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell (Seventh edition, second printing, 1958) 7. From C. A. M. Lindman, Bilder ur Nordens Flora scans from the 1917 edition available on the Net since 1997. The illustration may be by any one of a number of artists, or a combination. 8 Illustration (15 X 18 cm) by K. Quelprud (and Sara Mørk) from Korsmo, Vidme & Fykse Korsmos Ogräsplanscher, Stockholm: LTs Förlag (printed 1981) |
