Photography Project: Abstract images of spring flowers

February 27, 2014

1–2 minutes

abstract, art, creative, flower, flowers, iris, Lifestyle, nature, photo, photography, Photos, tulip, tulips

I can’t seem to get enough flowers lately. Between my new Fuji and just completing an on-line course in flower photography, I decided to try to conquer my nemesis – the Canon 65mm macro lens.

I think I am getting better with this lens, but I am still not even close to mastery. This time I adjusted my approach to focusing, which I think will also serve me well with the Fuji. My struggles centered around using my macro rails (the special tripod equipment that helps me make minute adjustments to camera/lens placement), and unfortunately Peter wasn’t around to help me sort it out. But there is always a next time. For this project, I wanted to work with:

Selective focus – picking just one element to be sharp (or in some cases, almost sharp – much to my dismay)
Negative space – using the shapes of the flowers and where they join with each other to highlight negative space
Color – the orange tulips, purple iris’ with yellow centers gave me a lot of opportunity
Curves – trying to accentuate the natural curves of the petals

I was disappointed when my subjects finally died, but was so inspired by the photography class, that I bought a couple of books to continue in my exploration of close-up photography (and flower arranging!).

5 responses to “Photography Project: Abstract images of spring flowers”

Cee Neuner

February 27, 2014 at 1:11 am

Beautiful photos!

Reply
Loretta S

March 2, 2014 at 11:33 pm

Mary, keep going with this! The idea of negative space and selective focus is intriguing. Lovely, mystical images with significant color impact. Interior floral landscapes. I’ve tried this with irises (difficult), roses, and tulips. This season I hope to try day lillies, too, since they have interesting curls on their petals. I have virtually the same tulip shot as the last one you have on this blog page, except mine is pink. Fun, fun, fun. Except we are getting more snow here on Long Island, NY as I write–no sign of flowers anywhere! Could you share what your on-line course was? URL?

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pamphotography

March 3, 2014 at 1:24 am

Hi Loretta – I agree I think Iris’ can be very challenging to capture. Day Lillies are a great idea – the LA Arboretum has a huge field of them, once they are in bloom I will have to give it a go. I’m not a cold weather gal – so the snow sounds terrible. Maybe some extreme macros of snowflakes?
The course I took was Photographing Flowers by Harold Davis. It’s on Craftsy.com. Scroll to the bottom and you should see it (unless it shows differently for me b/c I’m enrolled).
http://www.craftsy.com/classes/photography/all?_ct=sbqii-wqbbuho-ikrdql&_ctp=photography/all

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Steven Dillon

January 3, 2019 at 3:34 am

Very nice series of images. Love the color and detail in a couple of them. I’ve been WAY into abstract macro photography for the past couple of years. I have to say that iris make great subjects, but so far nothing compares to the day lilies.

Reply
1. pamphotography
  
  January 3, 2019 at 9:14 pm
  
  Hi Steven – thank you for your comment! You’ve inspired me to give day lilies another try :).
  
  Reply