Pixiq

It all began when I collected a water lily from our garden pond for a still life shot à la Mapplethorpe.  After rummaging through two cupboards filled with an array of vases and containers, nothing seemed a perfect match. So I decided to cut off nearly all the stem and simply float the flower in a large bowl of water. In this way, the water alone was the backdrop with no trace of any vessel or bits of other plants causing the eye to wander away from the exquisite flower.

As macro subjects go, the water lily was quite large so by stopping down to f/16 the whole flower appeared in focus. I always work hard to avoid distracting backgrounds; in this case, water provided a naturalistic yet uncluttered backdrop to this a three-dimensional flower. Since then, I have often floated flowers on water - not always so they appear at the same angle when attached to the plant. Sometimes I prefer to use used my studio with a large soft box above the water, so the lighting is controlled and constant.

I also take floating flowers in vessels outside as well as in our garden pond – always when there is a light cloud cover. The tonal appearance of the water varies with the time of day, the angle of light as well as the camera angle. Early and late in the day before direct sunlight appears, it can look almost black; yet when viewed against the light it may have a lovely silver sheen.

If I don’t want an overhead view, I will place a black or white vessel on a table so I can look down onto it at an oblique angle. The color of the vessel is less significant when the entire frame depicts a wall-to-wall covering of floating flowers.

This is a perfect technique for taking cut flowers on a warm day or in the tropics, because the flowers won’t wilt. It is also a lovely way to display flowers in the home – whether it be in a glass, wooden or metallic vessel.

Every spring I collect recently fallen camellias to float on water. However, it does not work for all flowers. Flimsy petals won't support the weight of the whole flower so it partially sinks – although if a short length of stalk is retained so the end rests on the bottom of the container, the flower will appear to be floating.

I have also seen displays of many floating flowers in large vats outside hotels or inside foyers where small individual flowers are arranged into larger blocks of color. Photographing floating flowers is not completely unnatural, since any that drop from plants overhanging water will do just that.