Flower Photography Techniques

With all the technical side of photography, the most overlooked flower photography techniques involve field-craft. Knowing about the life of the flower you want to photograph. Each species has different flowering times. Flowers may not be at their best towards the end of a flowering period. Get a good plant field guide to let you know what times and habitats your target flowers thrive in.
Set your alarm clock
You might not like getting up for early mornings, but you'll love the quality of light it gives your flower photography. You’ll also find that the flowers look their best as they've not been wilted from the day's sun. As a bonus the flowers take on a magical appearance when covered in shiny droplets of early morning dew.
You can use the early light in some creative flower photography techniques. Placing the sun behind the plant produces back-lighting. This is particularly effective if there are see-through areas the sun can shine through, like thin petals or leaves.
The golden light of dawn is nice, but cloudy days can be good as well. If bright and overcast you'll have perfect low contrast conditions for some close up detail shots. Getting so close means even the slightest breeze has a flower swaying across your viewfinder. Wait for a gap in the wind or just avoid frustration by picking a calm still day.
You may choose to take a flower portrait shot or an image depicting the wider scenery as well. You'll need to set different lens apertures and perhaps use different lenses for each approach. A wide aperture such as f5.6 will isolate the plant from its background leaving a pleasing blur behind the plant.
Flowers make a pleasing addition to a landscape photograph. Using flowers as foreground interest to lead the eye into the picture is effective.
A small aperture like f16 will reveal more of the flower's environment and so is a good choice for flowers in a landscape shot. The longer shutter-speed that this requires makes a tripod essential.
You may want shots of groups of flowers. If there are gaps between the flowers then a telephoto lens is a good choice. These longer focal lengths have an effect of compressing the perspective. The flowers will seem closer together.
Beware the grey flower!
A frame filling shot of a white flower will fool your camera. Your camera sees a great deal of white so tries to compensate for this by underexposing. This results in a grey looking flower.
Overexpose the shot to keep the flower looking its true white, but don't go too far or you'll lose highlight detail. Luckily with digital you can check the histogram and blinking highlights on your camera's LCD screen.
Your flower photography technique will improve with a tripod because it will force you to compose the shot carefully.
A heavy stable tripod may be a burden to carry, but you'll be rewarded with sharp flower photographs. Look for the heaviest you can afford with a low minimum height so you can get down to flower level. You don't want to be pointing the lens downwards as this perspective doesn't look good.

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