Flowers are one of the most fascinating subjects for artists, and photographers have always been attracted by these wonders of nature, like bees do to flowers all the time. It’s one of the best ways to bring the beauty of flowers to you through photos, without killing them. A plucked flower lives only for a while, but a photographed flower lives far longer and with more grace and pride. My father never allowed us to pluck flowers, as kids. He always emphasised that flowers are to be admired on the branch of it’s own plant, its like killing someone. In India, flowers are offered to gods and goddesses in temples all the time; whereas my father has been vehemently against it. He has always wondered that how do people justify this criminal act of “killing’ so many flowers and then offering to God who makes them. Will He like this act of being cruel to His nature? And I agree with my father in total. Well, at the same time, I also would not deny the fact that in this world we live by exploiting nature and flowers have given livelihood to many millions of people.

Here, I will try to share my experiences about flower photography with you all, though, more through my own flower photos. Also, I will try to share some experiences in words, as most of you would be keen to know how a particular image was created.

Slideshow

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Petals

a poem by Amy Lowell

Life is a stream
On which we strew
Petal by petal the flower of our heart;
The end lost in dream,
They float past our view,
We only watch their glad, early start.

Freighted with hope,
Crimsoned with joy,
We scatter the leaves of our opening rose;
Their widening scope,
Their distant employ,
We never shall know. And the stream as it flows
Sweeps them away,
Each one is gone
Ever beyond into infinite ways.
We alone stay
While years hurry on,
The flower fared forth, though its fragrance still stays.