Wildflower Photography - Tips & Techniques

Picture This
P.O. Box 310
Nevada City, CA 95959
(530) 478-5905
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Many photographers have requested information, tips and techniques on photographing wildflowers. Here is a veritable potpourri of ideas for your photographing pleasure! — Carol Leigh

Tips from Phillip Roullard
Tips from Carol Leigh
Tips from Jeff Conrad
Tip from Stacy Boorn

Phillip Roullard's tips:

First and foremost, put that ding dang camera on a tripod! I see more people not using a tripod and wondering why their shots are not sharp. Not a flimsy Slik or other off-brand — get a good Bogen or Gitzo tripod.
Get up early and shoot the sunrise in the best location. Scout the area the day before or during the dead time during the high noon sun.
While you are out scouting, shoot the details like flower close-ups. Be sure to use a gold or silver reflector to eliminate hard shadows or use fill-in flash to fill in the shadows. Set your flash on minus 1/3 to 2/3 in order to fill-in shadows. If you don't have a setting on your flash to set the amount of fill change your ISO number. Example: ISO is 100, set ISO at 120 or closet number, for minus 1/3 fill on the flash. Be sure to change it back when you are done. Full-power flash will blast the subject and will look unnatural. Try a light yellow or orange gel on the flash in order to get natural-like color in the flash. And/or use an 81A,B or C warming filter. A warming filter gives a nice warm tone to the subject. The gel works especially well at sunset in order to mimic the sunlight.
Cloudy days are great for flower close-ups using a little fill from a reflector or flash. If it is extremely cloudy you may have to wait for more light.
During mid-day if you have to shoot, try using a polarizer on the lens. Use the filter only at a 90 degree angle from the sun. You must open up approximately 1 to 1 1/2 stops or more sometimes in order to compensate for the diminished light coming through the filter. Meter a gray card and open up from that reading. Also use the polarizer at sunset for some great effects on landscapes.
Wait until sunset to shoot large fields of flowers, the light is golden and will render your subject much better than the harsh light of the day.
Take plenty of batteries for your camera — don't rely on getting to the location to find camera supplies or batteries.
Take more than enough film — you may just use it.

Carol Leigh's tips:

Fill your frame! If you're photographing daisies, then fill your frame with daisies — don't include the garden hose, the chainlink fence, dead sticks or other detritus in your shot. If you don't have a macro or close-focusing lens, then find BIG flowers to shoot and move in as close as possible. Or else find dense masses of flowers to shoot, so that you can fill your frame with flower-ness, not a wimpy little flower here, a wimpy little flower there. You want boldness, not tentativeness.
No matter what lens you have, you can take good flower photographs — you don't necessarily need a macro lens. Telephoto lenses (100mm-400mm) work very well to isolate a single flower against a colorful background of flowers. Because of the lens' inherent shallow depth of field, it's easy to focus on one flower in the foreground and let everything behind it turn into a wonderful out-of-focus colorful softness.
Look at flowers from a bug's-eye view. If you've got a wide-angle lens (anything from 14mm to 28mm), it's fun to use your camera's self-timer, place your camera face-up inside a bush of flowers (brittlebush works quite nicely), and then run like heck to get yourself out of the picture. The result can be quite interesting as the long stalks of flowers rise above your camera into the sky, giving your viewer a bug's-eye view of the outside world.
If color accuracy isn't important to you, you can really pump up the colors of some flowers by using an enhancing filter (made by Tiffen; about $72 for a 67mm filter size). This filter affects the warmer colors of the spectrum: yellows, reds, oranges, pinks, purples, etc. The effect can be stunning. The effect can also be disgusting if you inadvertently include anything light gray or white in your shot, like tree trunks or cement walkways — these turn a gross shade of magenta. So, as with any filter, be careful how you use it!

Jeff Conrad's tips:

Wind is never-ending a challenge when photographing wildflowers. This is especially so when doing closeups of tall flowers — in addition to motion blurring, composition and focus can constantly change.

The situation can sometimes be improved by using a small clamp to hold the flower stationary. A plastic clothespin makes an excellent clamp; the type I use is approximately three inches long and has two recesses of different sizes in the clamping end. If the clamp is applied carefully, so that the stem of the flower is held within one of the recesses, the flower is held sufficiently motionless without being damaged. I've shown the apparatus described below to numerous park rangers, and I've yet to encounter an objection.

The best way that I've found to attach the clamp to a support is a with small ponytail elastic. One end of the elastic is threaded through the center of the spring coil, the other end pulled around the end of the clothespin, and the first end of the elastic pulled taut. The result is an elastic loop of approximately 3/4-inch diameter.

I usually support the clamp with a Bogen flex arm mounted to a small tripod; I have a Bogen 3/8-inch rapid adapter mounted on the column of the tripod, and a 5/8-inch stud adapter fastened to the hexagonal end of the flex arm with a 3/8-inch set screw. This arrangement allows the flex arm to quickly be mounted either vertically or horizontally on the column. I secured the set screw to the flexible arm with threadlocker, and put a plastic thread protector over the 1/4-inch thread on the stud end of the arm.

Almost any small tripod will suffice, although a "tabletop" model may be too light to counterbalance the flex arm. I use a Gitzo 020, which allows the clamp heights from 0 to 80 inches. When I need to position the clamp close to the ground, I reverse the column.

The elastic loop on the clamp is a bit loose on the stud end of the flex arm, so I place a short piece of 5/8-inch ID rubber hose over the stud. The hose has a snug fit that is still easy to rotate; there are more elegant ways of attaching the clamp, but they require more effort to make, and don't seem to offer any practical advantages.

The flex arm can also be mounted in a Bogen Mini Clamp or Super Clamp attached to a leg of a tripod (in the latter case, the light stand adapter isn't needed). This is convenient if it is necessary to clamp more than one flower — there's a definite limit on the number of tripods that it's practical to carry! If the camera tripod has a 3/8 inch thread on the bottom of the column, the rapid adapter can be mounted on the bottom of the column, and the flex arm attached there.

There are, of course, many similar ways to achieve the same end. A small light stand can be used in place of the tripod, although it may not be as easy to position on uneven ground. The clamp can sometimes be attached directly to the column of the tripod, or even to a short wooden stake driven into the ground. I prefer the combination of the tripod and flex arm because it is quick and easy to set up, and works well in many situations.

I used the following components:

Plastic clothespin, 3 inch
Pony elastic, black, 3/16-inch diameter cord, approximately 1.75-inch diameter loop, Goody 71170
5/8-inch ID rubber hose, 1.25 inch long
Flex arm, Bogen 2896 (the heavy-duty 2896HD is much heavier and too stiff)
3/8-16 female thread to 5/8-inch stud adapter, Bogen 3357
3/8-16 x 3/4 set screw
Threadlocker, Loctite 242 (don't use Loctite 272, which will make the set screw very difficult to remove)
Thread protector, 1/4 inch
5/8 socket to 3/8-16 male rapid adapter, Bogen 3102 (a 1/4-inch version, 3105, is also available)
Tripod, Gitzo 020 (no longer sold)

The following can be used to mount the flex arm to a tripod leg or wooden stake:

Mini Clamp, Bogen 2940
Super Clamp, Bogen 2915 (or Avenger Super Clamp, Bogen C1575)

Stacy Boorn's Tip:

One I've learned from George Lepp (column, book, seminar) that I dearly love, but need to work on, is putting a 12mm extension tube behind a wide-angle lens, setting the focus to infinity and putting the lens right on the edge of a flower. This provides a great perspective. Be careful, however — if you are shooting alone, and no one is available to hold reflectors or to give light to your subject, you have to have the sun aimed at you, otherwise there is shadowing on your subject from your lens and body. [By using this technique, you'll be including a bit of the background.] I like to get some of the background in. It won't come into total focus, but at f/22 you get close, and now you have a real hint of the environment of the flower/plant. Works great with poppies and sea figs (ice plant), especially at the cliff edges. (Watch out for the loose ground — El Niño might get ya! Leaving a little less competition for the rest of us!)