Sunday, December 14, 2008

Six Tips To Enhance The Quality Of Your Flower Photos

By Ben Johnson

When taking photos of flowers, you want them to look their best. And since you like sunny days it is easy to get the idea that those sunny days also provide the best conditions for making pictures of your flowers and garden.

However, people who think that they need that sunlight to take a good picture are sadly mistaken. When it comes to taking photos of flowers in a garden, an overcast day may actually work better.

That was the first practical photo tip in this article. And here are a couple more:

Use a piece of cardboard to create a shadow: Hold the cardboard to shade the background. This will help to make the background darker and thereby less distracting.

Want more light on that special flower? Then take some object with a reflective surface like a mirror, and use that to shine extra light on your subject. The pro's use this method all the time.

Another thing you can do if you do not want to wait for the clouds is to make your own. Use a sheet of semi-opaque plastic, or a piece of white cloth. Secure this to a coat hanger made of wire. (The hanger should be formed into the shape of a square to make it serve better as support.) Then take this object and place it above the flower so that it provides some shade from the sunlight.

Using the sun as a back lightning for flower photos can prove to be quite interesting. In order to get the best effect, you can try placing the sun right behind the flower. This is not an easy task, but once you get the hang of it, then you can use it to your advantage. Some types of flowers will look semi-transparent when lit from behind.

Avoid taking photos of flowers in the middle of the day. That is when the sunlight is the most unforgiving. Instead, try to take photos early in the morning or right before the sun goes down.

Nowadays every camera has a zoom lens. Use that zoom function to make your flowers stand out better, by "zooming in". This tends to give you less problems with distracting stuff in the background, since it enlarges your subject relative to what is further away.

All these methods are stuff the pro's use all the time, and some of the reasons their results look so fantastic. You too can make photos like that if you learn their secrets. - 16039

About the Author: