Abstract Nature Photography Ideas

Abstract photographs strip a subject down to color, line, shape and texture. Nature is full of them — you just have to look closer, or move the camera differently.

Look closer: patterns and textures

1. Sandstone layers and desert varnish on canyon walls.
2. Shapes in slot canyon walls lit by reflected light — swirling forms that can look like figures or spirits.
3. Cracked mud in dried lakebeds.
4. Lichen on granite.
5. Frost patterns on windows and leaves.
6. Ice bubbles in frozen ponds.
7. Tree bark: aspen eyes, ponderosa puzzle plates, birch peeling.
8. Ripples in sand dunes at low sun.
9. Leaf veins backlit by the sun.
10. Seed heads and dandelion spheres.

Use water

11. Reflections of fall color in rippled water at slow shutter speeds.
12. Foam swirls in a plunge pool over several seconds.
13. Raindrops on a window with a colorful background.
14. Waves receding over wet sand.

Move the camera

15. Intentional camera movement (ICM): a vertical pan of 1/8–1/2 s through a forest turns trunks into brushstrokes.
16. Zoom bursts on colorful flowers.
17. Spin the camera on a tripod for circular blur.

Combine images

18. Multiple exposures of a wildflower field, one sharp and one defocused.
19. Kaleidoscopes: mirror a slice of a flower or leaf into a mandala with the kaleidoscope maker.
20. Square four-way reflections of tree canopies.
21. Layered textures from two related subjects.

Light and focus

22. Shallow depth of field through foreground flowers so color washes across the frame.
23. Silhouettes of grasses against a sunset.
24. Bokeh from sunlight through leaves.
25. Black-and-white minimalism: a single tree in fog — see black-and-white landscapes.

Tips

• Remove context: fill the frame so the subject is unrecognizable or ambiguous.
• Look for repetition broken by one different element.
• Rotate the image — abstracts don't need a "right way up."
• Make series: ten related abstracts are stronger than one.