I am constantly looking for inspirational flower photography, and recently I have been loving the work of Christine Ellger.
BIOGRAPHY
Christine Ellger was born in Germany in 1948. Her interest in photography was heightened with the advent of digital photography and the infinite possibilities it offers in terms of processing. Since she retired in 2010, Christine Ellger has been continually photographing the world she has been discovering on her travels. She collects photographs and subsequently retouches them, conferring a magical aspect to them stemming directly from her imagination. The originality of her work is thus based on its fantastical and hyperrealist rendering. At first glance, the spectator cannot make out the photographic technique used. Hyperrealist style is the identical reproduction of a photograph as a painting. This painting is often so realistic that the spectator comes to question the very nature of the work. This well and truly applies to Christine Ellger’s bewitching world.
Christine Ellger is known mainly for her fantastical composites but she has a considerable catalogue of flower photography. I have collated her beautiful flower photography here. Like her composites, they have a dreamy ethereal quality.
The learning for my own flower photography is:
- Usually single flowers and pairs
- The flowers are close up and fill the frame. On some only part of the flower is shown
- The square format usually works well
- Dark backgrounds and use of texture and light. The backgrounds include several dark colours.
- Plain background and textured flowers rather than textured backgrounds and plain flowers.
Brilliant