Garden photography
presents a number of possible angles, subjects, and vistas. Amidst all the
various plants and flowers in different lights and stages of growth and
blossoming, don’t forget a few shots of the visitors to your garden.
These visitors might
be your cat, dog, definitely the local bird population, and maybe a squirrel or
rabbit, perhaps from the neighboring field or forest. The most frequent
visitors tend to be the most challenging: butterflies and insects. Size means
you possibly overlook then until they are frightened away. Spend too much time
setting up a shot and they finish with one flower or plant and move on. Not
surprisingly, most butterflies prefer mid-day for their visit, a time when
lighting often produces too much reflection and the bright colors blur the
detail on your photograph. Mid-day also tends to be the time butterflies in
particular are most active.
In my recent shots of
garden visitors at Brooker Creek Preserve it was mid-morning in mid-summer in
Florida, so lots of sun. In this case I used a polarizing filter. I can't be sure it helped, it isn't what it is designed to do, but I tried it anyway. I took a
series of shots, and it definitely helped keep the detail I wanted. An elevated boardwalk surrounds the garden
providing the ability to change angles without tramping other vegetation.
Although the garden is small in diameter, the boardwalk also limits the ability
to get closer to those flowers in the middle, which is where the butterfly you
want to photography will choose to land and pose.
I took several
standard shots, mostly portraits of the butterflies but keeping the flowers
part of the picture also. The butterflies remained separated enough due to the
spacing of the flowers that a nice group shot of butterflies and flowers didn’t
happen. The few other insects generally took off before I could get them, but I
did get one nice bee shot.
After taking all the
standard shots, I stood and watched for a short while, conscious that I only
had a limited time before my next engagement. Walking around the garden on the
boardwalk I noticed the interesting shapes and colors from the back of the
flower with the butterfly feeding in front but part of the wings spread beyond
the flower itself. I managed one that I liked. I liked the nature/artist aspect
of those photographs, and plan to take more to see what combinations I can get.
