For many people, flower photography sounds like a great place to start messing around with advanced techniques. After all, flowers stay relatively still, unlike children, animals, weather, and just about anything else that makes a dramatic picture. With a flower, you just get up close and start snapping until you get something you like -- right?

Of course, nothing is that simple, and there are five serious mistakes people often make when photographing flowers. Avoid these errors and watch your flower photography blossom!

Mistake #1: Taking pictures in bright sunlight.

Most people think a bright, sunny day is the perfect background for flower photography. After all, flowers make us think of sunshine, summer, and bright colors. And to the naked eye, sunshine brings out the flowers' brightness.

But when you're dealing with a camera, sunshine is definitely not your friend. In fact, most photographers prefer to take their pictures on a slightly overcast day. Sunshine throws things into sharp contrasts. And with flowers in particular, the colors and details get obscured, melding into dark spots and bright spots instead of a unified whole.

Mistake #2: Not using even lighting.

This is related to taking pictures in bright sunlight. Under any kind of bright or uneven light, flowers lose their softness, their beauty. Any kind of bright light directed at one area of the flower will cause that high contrast shot, robbing you of the beauty you hoped to capture.

Your best bet for even lighting? Photograph on an overcast day, or use a diffusion disk to spread that sunlight around. Better still, try to practice flower photography in the early morning, just before sunrise: you get the joint benefits of even light and early morning dewdrops.

Mistake #3: Not considering backgrounds.

It makes sense to look for a beautiful flower when a flower is your primary subject. But think about how distracting the background of a photograph can be. In fact, if your background is too bright, detailed, or busy, it can completely ruin the effect you were going for. If you want to focus on the simple beauty of the flower, pick a background that's equally simple and complementary.

Mistake #4: Ignoring the dramatic impact of water.

Dewdrops on flowers are absolutely beautiful, and hard to find unless you want to get up before sunrise. So why not create your own? Spritz your flowers with water or, as professional photographers do, use a glycerin mixture. You can even practice flower photography in the rain as long as it's a still, gentle rainfall.

Mistake #5: Trying to take pictures in the wind.

Flowers are delicate. There's no way to keep them from bopping and dancing in the wind, and there's no way for your camera to capture such delicate movements. So unless you want the wind's motion creating blurs in your photos, forget about flower photography and turn your attention somewhere else on windy days.

Avoid these mistakes (and the others listed on 7PhotographyQuestions.com) to take your flower photography from good to great!