Category: Take better pictures of roses

It is much easier to get a lovely picture of an individual flower or even a small cluster of blooms than to take a good shot of the whole plant in a garden setting. If you see a shapely plant covered in fresh, open blooms, please give it a try, even if you tend to have more success with individual flower shots.

Great shrub or climber shots of roses in full flower in an attractive context are surprisingly rare. They simply don’t exist for many varieties.

I’m not confident about taking this kind of shot myself, but when the picture before you is so lovely, you have to have a go! This picture shows shrub and climbing roses near the peak of flower in a wide border around David Austin’s Plant Centre in Albrighton, England.

Blustery conditions present real problems for garden photography. It’s another roses are like dogs comparison, but even in a moderate summer breeze, some varieties of English roses will bounce around on the ends of their branches like enthusiastic young puppies hoping to be taken for a walk. If you’re hoping to take a few macro shots, it’s going to be hard enough keeping the bloom in shot, never mind in focus! Continue reading “Tips for photographing roses 11: keep an eye on the forecast”

I have watched (with real concern) as professional photographers struggled to reproduce colours accurately when taking pictures of cut flowers under studio lighting.  They’ve carefully calibrated their cameras, lighting, reflectors and computer screens. They’ve taken shots of test colour cards and used comparison software to prove that the colours will be reproduced accurately then, immediately afterwards, have taken a shot of a crimson rose that was well out by eye compared to the living flower.

When that happens, I suppose there’s not much you can do except blame the rose. I’m only teasing, though I can share a ‘strange but true’ observation:  Continue reading “Tips for photographing roses 10: getting colours right”

“To write a great novel, you need a really expensive pen, right?”

I’ll always remember David Perry saying this as he began his talk to a group of garden writers who were keen to become better photographers.

I noted how well he grabbed our attention from the start by expressing his ideas in a way we could immediately relate to. Writers and bloggers know that opening proposition isn’t true – if only! – so why would so many of us imagine an expensive camera will magically transform us into master photographers? Continue reading “Tips for photographing roses 9: it’s not all about your camera”

If you drive past what looks at first glance appears to be a wonderful or very unusual shot, do yourself a favour – turn round, go straight back and capture it. Don’t think you’ll feel more inclined to stop on your journey home.

I can rarely resist the opportunity to take pictures of roses, especially if they are at the peak of flower, but I’ll always regret not turning back to photograph a dishevelled cottage, set just a little way back from the road on a busy street somewhere in the South of England. The yard was full of hollyhocks in flower – I’ve never seen so many in one garden. Continue reading “Tips for photographing roses 8: always go straight back”

Take advantage of the best light by taking pictures early or late in the day. I’ve heard garden photographers rave about the diffused light of misty mornings, but they’ll also tell you that the perfect light is surprisingly rare. Continue reading “Tips for photographing roses 7: the golden hour”