Framing the Beauty of the Sparkling Garden Landscape

Why are we like magpies with sparkly things, drawn to where the light is? There's an evolutionary answer, and it all feeds into the garden photographer's raison d'etre. Here's an introduction to the way my creative cogs whirr in a beautiful garden.

When Marilyn Monroe shimmied around singing that ‘Diamonds are a girl’s best friend’, she spoke for many of us that are drawn to the sparkly things in life. I recently read that this magpie tendency has its roots in our evolutionary survival instinct. Sparkling indicated the possibility of nearby water, and therefore meant preservation of life. Sunlight, of course, offered crops the chance to grow.