Nice work
My ex parents in law owned a Orchid nursery and asked me to make a business presentation.
They started to grow mini plants on chemical breeding ground, multiplying on turn tables growing in climate cells to finally bring them to flower on automated tables under huge green houses.
Interesting business.
I had to photograph their own cultured variants. If I remember correct they where specialized in Bulbophylums and Vanilla.
I recognize the difficulty of shooting these plants in your approach. Depending on the type of flower, the Orchid specialist is interested to look in the flower or in another case more the outside. And how this epiphyte grows his roots in air or on bark, etc etc.
I built a small darkened studio in the greenhouse where I had the light ratio in hand and sufficient distance between flower and backdrop made it possible to darken out the background without photoshop. This solved my issue with the sometimes unnatural transition between the flowers edge and the black background.
Eventually I stoped with this approach and I started to photograph the plants in there ‘natural’ habitat / greenhouse location. The greenhouse had a showcase area where you could walk under and between the plants. I found the results of this approach more natural and pleasing to look at.
I quickly learned that a photographic compelling picture of an Orchid was often of no value to use it in a catalogue or in slide decks for Orchid aficionados.
Difficult,...difficult.
(I was also that stupid to accept an assignment to photograph Canaries....... Never new there are fifty shades of yellow)
