Flower Photography: 10 tips for Photographing Dahlias

Flower gardens are more than just beautiful places to admire, they’re visited by many bugs, bees, butterflies and other beneficial insects on their daily trips for nectar. While you may stumble upon a stunning field of lavender, sunflower field or rose garden, the dahlia garden is an especially wonderful place for photography. These flowers are classified into 15 different groups, which describe the structure of the flower, and a garden full of dahlias will often feature many of these different varieties. So many, in fact, that you can get lost taking photographs of dahlias for hours. Many arboretums and botanical gardens will dedicate an entire garden to these beautiful flowers. They bloom from the middle of the summer through the first frost in fall which gives you plenty of time to visit your local dahlia garden and make great images.

Any camera you have will work to photograph dahlias—Z series mirrorless, DSLR or COOLPIX. Ideal lenses include fast primes for shallow depth of field and macro lenses to get super close to the flowers and any insects that may be visiting at that moment. You could even use a short telephoto lens if that’s the only lens you own—you may have to stand farther back from the flower or flowers you want to photograph, depending upon the close focus distance of the lens. The lens’ manual will tell you the minimum distance you’ll be able to focus. 

A COOLPIX camera is another great option. A large focal length zoom range will let you capture a variety of close up and more normal view compositions and the macro mode will let you get within inches of your subject for super detailed shots.

We’ve put together 10 tips to help you improve your dahlia photography.

Golden Hour. Golden hour is the time of day—early morning and late afternoon—where the light is soft, warm toned without harsh shadows. In fact, many nature and landscape photographers will only go out during this time of day when subjects are more beautifully lit as opposed to the midday sun with its harsh shadows and bright light.

Use a fast lens. When you’re photographing a subject like an individual flower, you want to have a clean background and often the way to do this is to use a wide aperture like f/1.2 up to f/2.8 to blur the background. Cluttered backgrounds can be distracting and in a garden where you might not have much of a choice as to what your background is, being able to blur it with the beautiful bokeh of a wide aperture is the best way to give the flower a soft blurred background of color, helping it stand out more. 

Expose correctly. Because many dahlias often have colors that softly blend into one another, it's important your exposure is correct. Adjust your white balance to match the type of lighting you’re photographing in. Slight underexposure can deepen the colors of the flowers, making them appear richer and more saturated. More importantly, your camera will be able to capture the textures and minute details of each flower. Photo editing software will allow you to adjust the exposure if you want to lighten the shadows. You can pull the detail out of the shadows, but you can’t add detail back in to blown-out highlights.

Focus. Because dahlias can be so elaborate and multi-layered, you want to make sure your focus is pleasing to the viewer. Often, focusing on the center of the flower will work best. But you can also compose your image in such a way that focusing off-center will work better. Experiment, take lots of shots and see what works best! 

Fill the frame. Because dahlias have such amazing, detailed patterns, textures and colors you want to get as close as possible and fill the frame. This is what makes taking photographs with a camera—whether mirrorless or DSLR or even point & shoot—so much better than with a smartphone. Use a macro lens to reveal details that may be difficult to see with the naked eye. Nikon Z-mount macro lenses carry the MC designation, while the Nikon F-mount macro lenses use the Micro-NIKKOR name.

Include visitors. Bugs make a great addition to a photograph of a flower, especially dahlias. And they’re going to be in abundance. Bees and butterflies in particular with flit from flower to flower collecting nectar. This is when your macro lens will come in really handy—as you can capture these small subjects in impressive detail. If you don’t have a macro lens, you can try using a telephoto lens and zoom in. Just know that you may have to take a few steps back for the lens to achieve focus. 

Increase depth of field. There are times though, that you might want deeper depth of field – if you’re photographing multiple blooms at once or a particularly large flower. Use a narrower aperture, such as f/16 or f/22 and review the image to make sure the important areas are in focus. Keep in mind that depth of field will also depend on your focal length, focusing distance and the distance between the flowers.

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Try a creative composition. Look for ways to photograph the dahlia blooms in a different way. A great idea is photographing the back of the flower or even get so close that the flower fills the entire frame, with no visible background. You’ll find dahlias in every stage from young buds to full blooms in a dahlia garden. Make the most of your time and explore how each stage can create a distinctive image.

Lighting. Side lighting or backlighting can show off the textures in the flowers. Even though one of the earlier tips in this article mentioned shooting in the warm light of golden hour, shooting under the bright midday sun will give you harsh shadows that may work for the story you want to tell. On the flip side, you can also use a small reflector to fill in shadows or a Speedlight for fill-flash. 

Think beyond the traditional snapshot. Shoot in monochrome, experiment with Picture Controls & color shifts with white balance adjustments.

Black & White (monochrome) is an unusual option to create a truly unique image of a colorful flower. With a garden full of vibrant color you might not think of shooting in monochrome, but with the right subject and lighting, it can work well. Within the Picture Controls of Nikon mirrorless cameras and DSLRs you can choose true B&W or more of a sepia tone. 

Certain Picture Controls are designed to help you photograph subjects in a natural or faithful color palette but you can also use many of the more creative Picture Controls like Toy, Dream or Dramatic for a really different look. 

Deliberate color shifts made by adjusting the white balance to a setting that differs from the actual lighting of the scene  can lend a warmer or cooler feel to your images. Experiment and see what works best for the images you're making.

Dahlia societies are dedicated to growing and promoting dahlias around the world. A little searching on the internet may find one near you, if you’d like to learn more about these beautiful blooms or grow the flowers in your own garden to photograph.