Shooting Flowers
I’ve had a camera in my hand since I was 8. My dad bought my sisters and I each our own Kodak Instamatic camera; a decision he came to regret when we would shoot hundreds, maybe thousands, of pictures of our cat Butterscotch and then hand him the film to get developed. I still have a photo album from 5th grade filled with black and white shots of school field trips, family vacations, and the cat.
Fast forward 35 years and I was running my own photography studio, shooting mostly high school senior portraits. I loved this time in my life. I had a studio filled with gorgeous dresses, trays of jewelry, and lots of flowers for every shoot. I even had the most incredible makeup artist come and to do each clients’ makeup before the shoot.
Now in my semi-retirement phase of life I shoot the flowers that I grow and I couldn’t be happier. Shooting flowers is really no different then shooting teenage girls; definitely easier. The basics are the same; sharp focus, lovely light, careful composition. Currently I shoot with a Sony A7rll, but honestly, your phone camera can do a great job. Now that I’m shooting for collage work I shoot one flower at a time so that I can print them and cut them out. Often on the floor of my studio which has great light. Outside in the shade works well too. Just make sure the light where you are shooting is not too yellow or too blue; you want the actual true color of each flower to come across in the photos.
The first shot I ever took of flowers (see below) was a pot of impatiens in my mom’s patio in 2003. Nothing special, but it got my wheels spinning on floral art photography and I’ve been building that skill ever since. I highly recommend the beautiful practice of taking pictures of flowers and nature. Grab your phone and look for interesting colors and textures. Or build a bouquet from your garden or the grocery store and shoot “macro” (very close up to show form and detail). Five years ago I started buying a big bouquet every week at the local farmer’s market just to shoot. The next thing I knew my flower photographs were on a billboard in Times Square! That’s another story for me to share in an upcoming blog post. Stay tuned, and in the meantime go shoot some flowers!
