Featured this month in the Arizona Highways gift shop is a nature photographer who should be familiar to recent readers of the magazine.
Eirini Pajak began contributing to Highways a few years ago — you might remember her from It's in the Details, her portfolio in our January 2015 issue. But at least one of her photos has been in seemingly every issue since then.
Many of Pajak's images feature a photographic technique known as focus-stacking. She shoots with the lens almost wide open, then manually focuses through the plane of the flower, one millimeter at a time. She then "stacks" the images using a computer program. Doing so allows her to control the depth of field in the background and get focus through the subject.
Pajak studied photography in college but didn't keep up with it after she graduated. A decade later, a monk at St. Anthony's Monastery in Florence, where Pajak often attends services, suggested she start photographing wildflowers. "He added, specifically, not to overlook even the tiniest flowers," she says. That suggestion has shaped her photographic style.
"I've seen so many amazing images of poppies and lupines, but there is a whole world of neglected — and often quite tiny — flowers that are no less beautiful," she says.
To get a look at Pajak's work or purchase a print, stop by the gift shop, located at 2039 W. Lewis Avenue in Phoenix. It's open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. A portion of the purchase price benefits Arizona Highways' mission of promoting travel to and through Arizona.