[matthew]

You give a man color film, and sooner or later you will catch him out in the garden taking pictures of flowers. This seems inevitable. He just can't resist.
- Mike Johnston

Flowers have always been a popular subject for photographers, and we've certainly seen them before in this forum. But somehow we've never really looked at them as a subject in their own right. For the next few weeks, let's create something new and look at flowers in different ways. Flowers can be found everywhere, from the southern climates where spring is just beginning, to simple bouquets in our northern homes. And of course things don't have to be growing to be flowers - they can often be found in design and art all around us, so be open to that as well.

[Irma]

Thanks Matthew for this assignment!

I have been working a lot with flowers in the past weeks, I will share some of them later here. At the moment, I worked this series specially for this assignment as I wanted to have a different approach about the topic flowers, and I wanted to show how flowers are shown in Mexican handcraft. The reason I decided a bw image was to focus in the flowers and not be distracted by the colors. I wanted also a more stylish, and maybe a gallery look too...

Anyway, here they are and I hope you all enjoy them.

[Zig]

Neat assigment, Matt.
Nicely done Irma.

[Irma]

Thanks Zig...

[Zig]

Sorry: neither new or groundbreaking. Will seek inspiration next few days I hope.

[Irma]

All very beautiful Zig... but that second one... is just perfect!!

[matthew]

Irma, thanks for pushing a bit and getting some non-flower flowers: I'm really hoping to see more along those lines. They're such an important part of art and design, but it's so easy to overlook them.

Zig, my vote's for the last one, although I agree that they're all really strong. I really like it as a landscape as well as its appeal for this assignment.

I don't have anything groundbreaking either, but I did shoot these for the assignment a couple of nights ago:

[Rabid Penguin]

I went out this morning to a local park and took a bunch of photos for this assignment. Ended up with 10. Apart from the roses, I have no idea what they are.

#1


#2


#3


#4


#5


#6


#7


#8


#9


#10

[Zig]

Love that variegated rose!
I do agree that Irma's "flowers as other materials" could be the more exciting direction for us/it; I admit this is taking me much Sherlock Holmes-type deduction, as I KNOW there are floral representations in all manner of sacred and vernacular architecture round here, but like a joke when I want to remember it, I can't think where they are for the moment. Am looking forward to how this one goes.

[aine-caitlin]

Irma, your shots are very nice. I especially like the first one, and I like the fact that you did them in black and white.

Zig, beautiful shots. I love the bleeding hearts.

Matt, I think that second shot is outstanding.

RP, the peppermint rose is lovely. I used to have one in my front yard until some unruly kids destroyed it. My favorite of these shots, though, is #6 of the Canna.

I recently visited the National Ornamental Metal Museum, which is a museum in Downtown Memphis devoted to the preservation and promotion of fine metalwork. The front gate is decorated with over 300 metal rosettes representing the work of metal smiths from all over the world. Each rosette is about the size of a doorknob and no two are alike.

[Irma]

Matthew, your second picture is really a winner... a great macro with so many shades of orange!

RP very beautiful collection of roses. #3 and #8 would be my favs from the series.

Aine, that museum must be a beautiful place to go. I think you had very nice light to show textures and these roses you are showing are really beautiful.

As Zig said... I was playing a bit Sherlock Holmes at home today to find what things I had with flowers in the lables or in the design.

At this time of the year I always wait for G with a pot of tea so I took this picture with the box that has a flower pictureof the berries the tea comes from.



I found some camomile in the bathroom....



Already in the bathroom, I saw my set of boxes I have for my beauty treasures...



Looking for flowers in the supermarket I saw that there are very few lables that have flowers. A pudding, a chocolate (which I really don't like, otherwise I would have bought them) and a box of kleenex.

I'll keep looking...

[Zig]

I do like this last one; something comforting about lines(OMG...I'm becoming Matthew!)

[Irma]

Thanks Zig....

Telling the truth I was a little unsure about this last one. I am very happy for your comment....

[Keith Alan]

Due to the terrible lack of rain this year, flowers and pretty much every other type of living thing has been in short supply.
Now that temperatures have fallen over the past few weeks, the plants are enjoying a late season burst of activity. (I finally have hot peppers!)

I have been waiting to try my new camera on such things, so a few days ago I shot these photos for the assignment as well as for my own enjoyment.

All are setting-sun natural light, 200-300mm-e from around 4 feet away.


Our variegated bougainvillea is positively bursting with flowers now, after looking like a few vines with even less leaves all year:



These balls are whatever you call the reproductive parts of our sycamore tree, so they qualify as flowers in my book:


Here's the status of our conversion to brown leaves, with the grayish bark of this backyard giant as a backdrop:



Our "Valley Lemon" tree is now passing a meter in height, and this fruit is one of four that will surely die or drop when the first light freeze hits.
All fruit starts out as a flower, so I'm including it here:



After spending around 10 minutes shooting the above photos, I went to get the mail and noticed these flowers in my neighbor's front yard that had completely slipped my mind:


It was a complete departure for me to shoot flowers using a long lens at a distance of several feet handheld, instead of getting close and using a tripod and flash.
For a lens that Sony almost gives away, the bokeh isn't as bad as one might expect.
This is due to the aperture's design--each leaf (or petal) is curved in such a way as to make the aperture almost circular at most settings.
A smart design feature.


This last one is an out-take from my snail shoot last year.
An immature hibiscus blossom dinner, shot with my F717 and off-camera flash:

[slejhamer]

Great stuff! Love the snail eating dinner; that's one for the nature mags.

Here are some future flowers; we were cleaning up the oak and maple leaves in the back yard a couple weeks ago, but the crepe myrtle hadn't yet dropped. So the leaves were bright red-orange-yellow, making the brown buds stand out a bit.

[Wedding Shooter]

Wow - wonderful work everyone. Flowers are so varied in their look and colour - just like the beautiful pictures here.