Last week I was walking in my neighborhood and saw crocus popping up. This is a sign that spring is not too far away. It will be another month till it is true by the calendar. Taken with iPhone 5C. Camera+ app.The image on the right macro mode was used. Edited in PSE 11 with minor edits, cropping, increased highlights, sharpening. 
This Saturday 2/27/2016 the Triad Outdoor Photographer's Club had a macro workshop at Leonard Recreation Center. Organizers brought various props, macro subjects, and background papers/cloths, etc. The subject I liked the best was some small feathers. The image on the left used Camera+ app with no editing. A piece of black felt was used for the background. You can see evidence of lint. The image on the right I used the macro mode in Camera+ app because I wanted to zoom in and fill the frame to show more texture. This image I edited in camera with clarify filter and added sharpening. Then in PSE 11 I cloned out any extra lint from the black background. This was my favorite image with the iPhone. This room had overhead fluorescent lighting. 
For the Triad Outdoor Photographer's Club Meeting in February, members were asked to submit photos for the subject "stone". I went to the Greensboro Science Center gift shop and purchased some unpolished gemstones. The polished ones can give off a glare even with natural lighting. I used a black velvet jacket as my background and window lighting from my bay window which faces northern exposure. Taken with iPhone 5C Camera+ app. The image on the right was taken in Macro mode. Some gemstones are purchased for their healing properties (WICCA). Minimal editing with PSE 11. The stone on the right is Calcite. The other stones in the left image are: Amethyst, Rose Quartz, Fuchsite, Sodalite, Amazonite, Lepidolite. 
I went to my friend's garden. Sue Hughes. She has a lot of the Christmas Rose (Lenten Rose). It is a species of the Hellaborus which is blooming right now in NC. This has not relation to the rose family. This plant can bloom as early as Dec. and continue through March. Sue had at least 3 different varieties. At first I wanted to try some photos with the iPhone 5C with the Camera+ app. However. the sun was shining and I was not happy with the exposure. Also more difficult to get everything in sharp focus for a close up. The image on the left is a close of the sepals which is pretty sharp and not cropped. I did lighten the image and sharpen slightly in PSE 11. The image on the right is a different cultivar. With the LED screen I had difficulty getting a sharp focus of the sepals with bright sun. I did crop, increase the highlights, sharpen, and applied a vignette as well as use healing brush to clone out some artifacts. This view gives more a view of the blossom, the bud, and leaves of the plant. This is a good plant for winter when nothing else seems to be blooming in the garden. It can be invasive unless you control seed heads. 
About February lst, I got a viral Upper Respiratory Infection that was really bad. Have not been spending much time with taking images or posting any on the blog. For photo club meeting I had taken a picture of an airplant at the Conservatory @ UNC-Charlotte. I tried applying a color variation and inverting. I like the texture and patterns of airplant foliage. The image on the left is taken with overhead lighting through the ceiling glass. Minimal editing to increase highlights and sharpness. The image on the right I further increased the green color and then used invert filter. 
This is my attempt to take pictures of cinnamon sticks for the February TOPS theme: "stick and/or stones". Not very happy with the composition and the ones in a row have issues with sharply defined edges because I tried to correct some shadows using a paintbrush tool. The image on the left is taken with cinnamons sticks placed on grey cardstock and using outdoor lighting in the late afternoon. Liked the diagnonal compostion. I am putting an image of them lined up on the cardstock, but the light was not good to define the sticks. I had tried yellow card stock but the camera saw the sticks a purple. So, I am going to retake in different lighting. Hope I can try to take more images with different lighting and replace. Taken with iPhone 5C f 2.4, 1/60 sec @ 5:15 p.m.
The TOPS camera club has decided for the month of February to start using subjects to help increase our exploration of photography as well as allow post processing use of filters, etc., i.e allow more creativity. It is going to be the program to review those images. It will be interesting to see what images the other members use for the topics "sticks and/or stones". My neighbor, Jason, has some stones (pebbles) around his AC unit. So, I took a close of those. Images taken with iPhone 5C, f 2.4, 1/2000 sec @ 1:34 p.m. The left image is "as taken"and sun was shining brightly. I used PSE 11 to edit the right images by changing the highlights & midtones, sharpening slightly, and then using a saturated filter x2 to increase the colors without going to the extreme. This gave image more depth.