David Walker

During my years as a amateur photographer, in return for me continually taking my time to take my photographs and delaying her holiday ambitions, my wife demanded that return the favour by accompanying her to formal gardens and other floral events. This was not too bad a deal, because there are plenty of opportunities to use the camera! She likes to linger so I can take a reasonable amount of time to set up and compose my shots, a good definition of a win/win scenario?

However, in those early days of photographic venturing, things did not work out well for my floral photography. At my camera clubs, judge after judge, gave scathing feedback about the shots, in frankly a mean and unnecessary way. I understand that “perfect” flower photography should be undertaken with a perfect specimen, on a windless day, with no insidious incursions from other species, such as plants or insects, with perfect lighting, from the perfect aspect, and of course fit absolutely within the “rule of thirds” as perceived by their interpretation of the “rules” by these so called judges.

Judges, at local camera club level, tend to lack artistic impression and make this up by adopting mechanical approaches to the subject of photography. The “rule of thirds” is no more than a guideline certainly not a “rule”. I pity these judges and the poor souls who are subjected to their whims and lack of artistry! Needless to say I am no longer a member of a camera club, I will not even acknowledge their status by using capital Cs.

Then came PhotoArt. I am fully aware, that even with artistic interpretation, an image of a floral subject should be clearly representative of the subject, but with the ability to use watercolour techniques an image can be produced which takes the cold precision of a photograph and turns it into, in my opinion, a much more pleasing rendition of the subject.

I have a myriad of images of flowers…indeed all types flora….from weeds, to grasses, to indoor plants, to greenhouse specialties, to European species, to Australian species, to windswept coastal plants (again weeds?), to flora from my wife’s own garden. Many of these I have converted many to artistic renditions based on a watercolour technique I have developed in conjunction with several different programs.

I hope you find a specimen you like!