Flower Power

By Jenn Gidman
Images by Holly Awwad

Holly Awwad used to while the hours away as a kid poring over her dad’s Time Life photography books, returning over and over to the different genres represented in their pages. College offered Holly the chance to take photography courses, but an eventual career in banking temporarily pulled her away from taking pictures—until her children were born and she found herself once more immersed in the craft. “I started out as a typical ‘mom-tog,’ but as my children have grown, I’ve found nature and floral photography to be much more relaxing and cooperative subjects,” she says.

For this type of close-up photography, Holly uses the Tamron 28-75mm F/2.8 DI III VXD G2 zoom lens for her Nikon mirrorless camera. “One of the things I appreciate most about this lens is that it’s so incredibly versatile,” she says. “I brought it on a family trip and didn’t have to bring any other lenses, because it works beautifully for portrait and lifestyle work, as well as floral and nature images. It focuses closer than a typical prime lens, so when zoomed out to 75mm, I can get up close to my subject and achieve that creamy background isolation around my focal point. On the flip side, I can zoom out and get a wider angle as needed.”

The 28-75mm G2’s sharpness also stands out. “Sometimes when choosing a zoom over prime lenses, you sacrifice some sharpness for the convenience of the ability to zoom in or out,” Holly says. “But that’s not the case here. This lens is tack sharp.”

When she’s composing photos, Holly first scouts out what kind of light she’s working with, and how it falls on her subjects. “In situations of high contrast, I typically expose for the highlights to add depth and dimension to my images,” she says. “The six images you see here were all shot on the same day at a beautiful botanical garden in western Michigan. It was very overcast that day, so I had to crank up my ISO quite a bit, especially for the photos I took in the woods or indoors.”

With a style she describes as “happy and colorful,” Holly prefers to shape and enhance the light in her images to give them a hopeful feel. “Flower photography is something I do just for me, and it’s very much an exercise of gratitude as I try to find beauty in the everyday,” she says. Check out some of her flower photography tips below.

HOLLY’S QUICK FLOWER PHOTOGRAPHY TIPS

Look for something unique that catches your eye.
Sometimes it’s a bold color, or a texture. Oftentimes, it’s a flaw. Take that yellow cluster of flowers with one orange bloom, which I stumbled upon inside a butterfly greenhouse. It was tucked off in the corner, but that one orange blossom among the yellow stood out to me. I cropped in a little closer and added some directional light in post-processing to highlight this unusual beauty.

28-75mm (75mm), F4, 1/320 sec., ISO 250

Use composition to draw viewers into the frame.
I love using natural elements to frame my focal point. Sometimes it’s natural framing, other times it’s leading lines. Sometimes a flower stands on its own with a minimalistic approach.

28-75mm (75mm), F4.5, 1/640 sec., ISO 1250

I also try to place my main focal point on an intersection of a classic compositional flower photography technique, such as the rule of thirds, golden ratio, or even center composition. For the curled fern shown here, I wanted the focus to be on the beautiful curl, but the light was flat, so I used the editing process to shape the light and draw the eye to the fern’s shape.

28-75mm (75mm), F4, 1/320 sec., ISO 250

Be cognizant of backgrounds.
I don’t want distracting elements that will draw attention from my subject and story. The photo here of the pink flowers was challenging. The garden had many of these flowering trees, but most of them were too high for me to capture. I found one branch low enough to capture, but there was a waterfall in the background creating a distracting white blob behind the flowers I wanted in focus. I used editing to clone out the white spots. The same with the purple tulips you see here. The background had a fence blurred out at the top of the frame, so I used a light overlay to camouflage the fence.

28-75mm (75mm), F4, 1/1250 sec., ISO 250

28-75mm (75mm), F4, 1/1250 sec., ISO 400

Be prepared for some action.
You never know when an insect or other creature will fly into your frame. The biggest challenge for the butterfly photo shown here was the movement. I had to be very patient. I observed the butterflies and focused on the flower, waiting for one of them to land, and when it did, I shot in burst mode to ensure I captured one in focus.

28-75mm (75mm), F4.5, 1/125 sec., ISO 400

To see more of Holly Awwad’s work, check out her website and Instagram.

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