Mark Bauer
Mark is a full-time landscape photographer and author of eight photo books. A multi-award winner, his most recent success was winning the Wildflower Landscapes category of the International Garden Photographer of the Year. See www.markbauerphotography.com and @markbauerphotography on Facebook and Instagram.
One of the joys of spring is watching the landscape come back to life as wildflowers begin to bloom: bluebells and wild garlic in woodlands, cow parsley on the verges, and swathes of pink thrift across cliff tops. As the season progresses and turns into summer, these sights are replaced by fields of red as poppies spring up on agricultural land, and later in the summer, carpets of purples across heathland as heather reaches its peak. All of these make great subjects for landscape photography.
Head to the woods
In early spring, one of the best environments to shoot wildflowers is woodland. Bluebells and wild garlic can create some of the most impressive displays of wildflowers you’ll see, often with colour stretching far into the distance. The most photogenic woods are those populated with rows of regular, straight trunks such as beeches and where the forest floor is clean and clear of debris. It’s worth scouting locations before planning a shoot, even to a familiar location, as forest management activity means this can change a lot from one year to the next. Try to avoid photographing in bright sunlight as contrast can be extreme and woodland rarely photographs well in these conditions. Instead, shoot on bright but overcast days, or in the golden light at the beginning or end of
