Flowers hold such magic for most people. Maybe it’s the delicate beauty people are most drawn to, or it could be that they signify life renewed as many of the best times to shoot flowers is in the spring. Regardless, they make great photography subjects and provide incredible foregrounds for landscape shots, intriguing macro images, and beautiful portraits at almost every angle with the right light.
Flower Pictures
Here are a few quick tips for taking great flower images as well as 55 beautiful pictures for your inspiration.
Find the best light. This can be said about pretty much any photo that you’re trying to improve on. You might even find that flowers change during different times of the day and with different lighting conditions, making for more interesting compositions and opportunities to get a unique shot. If you find a great field of flowers, visit it often at different times to see what might work best for the image you’re trying to make.
Turn off the autofocus on your camera. What’s great about digital cameras is that you can take thousands of shots and not have to develop all of them; just choose the best image off the card. That means there is plenty of time to be patient and get the right shot. Turning off the autofocus gives the photographer the ability to focus exactly on the point in the flower composition that they are trying to capture. Getting the perfect shot isn’t always about running around the field and snapping as many photos as you can with your camera on full auto. Sit down with the flower of your choice and take your time setting up the camera in manual mode, testing out different compositions and settings, and really focusing on creating a sharp image.
Find out the name of the flower you’re shooting. Maybe this isn’t exactly photography related, but there is nothing like stumbling over your words trying to explain to someone what type of flower is in that beautiful picture that you made. Getting into flower photography gives you the opportunity to increase your botany knowledge and understand a lot more about the subjects you’re shooting.
Two of the best resources we’ve found on improving your wildflower photography are by PhotoNaturalist; Free eBook on Wildflower Photography and The Complete Guide to Photographing Wildflowers ($12).
Susanne Nilsson – Flower
Daniel Krieg – Flower
Kari Bluff – Flowering dogwood
Kuster & Wildhaber Photography – flower
solarisgirl – Flower
llee_wu – Flowers
Marufish – Tropical Flower
Aurimas – Flowers
Marcelo César Augusto Romeo – Flowers Dream
Andrew Malone – Flower
Kamel Lebtahi – Flowers
aotaro – Flower
Jason Hunter – Flower
Lennart Tange – Flower
Francis Martin Hain – White Flower
Chris – FlowerTop
Budiman Salleh – Flowers at Dome
Acid Pix – flower shadow
Alberto Abouganem Stephens – Flower
Kenny Murray – Flower n' grub
Dennis Hill – flower
Christian Reusch – Flowers
Jdmoar – Flower
walmarc04 – Flower
m01229 – Flowers – Lake Harriet
Scott Parker – flower
Pedro – Flowers
JB Kilpatrick – Flower Close-up
oatsy40 – Three White Flowers
kev-shine – flower
Francis Martin Hain – White Flower
Rodrigue ROMON – Flower
Chris – Wild Flower
Yuri Levchenko – Purple and red flower
amzongrl1 – Flower
walmarc04 – Flowers in the garden, wild flowers
Alessio Villardita – Flowers
Paul Stein – Flower at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens, Brooklyn, New York
Paul Hudson – Flowers growing in the car park at work
Ken – Flowers in the rain
llee_wu – Flowers
TomGough – Flower Macro
Shawn Lyte – Flower of the Day
Jeff Kubina – Flowers
Norlando Pobre – Flower Power
Vince – Flower
Kim Siever – Flowers
Karsten Wentink – Flowers & Bees
jans canon – Flowers
Adam Greig – flowers
Ky Dally – Purple Flower, water
Adrian Scottow – Flowers at twilight with a bug
Alejandro Mallea – Spring flower
Aaron Warren – Flowers
Yuri Levchenko – St Johns Wort
More Flower Photography Inspiration
TPA – 55 Beautiful Macro Flower Pictures
A blog post from our archives, this stunning gallery takes flower photography to the next level with macro shots.
Contrastly – Floral Photography: Ways to Improve Your Craft
Simple techniques to help bring the best light into your flower pics.
noupe – 50 Beautiful Examples of Flower Photography
A wonderful collection of flower photos featuring lots of bright colors.
DPS – 41 Delicious Flower Photographs
Digital Photography School has some of the best inspirational photo galleries out there. These flower pictures will definitely inspire you to get out and shoot some close ups. DPS also offers many great tutorials and tips for those looking to make their flower photos even better.
Abduzeedo – Breathtaking Flower Fields Photography
Rather than focus on the close up, this blog post features fields of flowers which will give you some great landscape composition ideas.
500px – 31 Incredibly Captivating Flower Photos by Wei-San Ooi
Wow. This post features some of of the most beautiful flower photos I’ve ever seen. My favorites are the macros with water droplets.