My gardens are made up entirely of reds, oranges, yellows, and white, so I am excited about this thread. I'm hoping I'll get some good ideas! I WS Lychnis 'Lumina Bronzeleaf Red' twice this year, but the sprouts died both times. So here is what is currently in my garden:

Achillea 'Paprika' and 'Walter Funke'
Crocosmia 'Lucifer'
Dianthus 'Ideal Select Red' (supposed to be an annual but all of mine came back)
Geum 'Blazing Sunset' (mine are just WS babies, so I won't see the blooms until next year)
Gaillardia 'Burgandy', and 'Goblin' is a partial red
Hemerocallis 'Pardon Me', 'Merle Kent', and 'Principal Wife'
Mum 'Red Dandy'
Penstemon pinifolius 'Compactum', Penstemon barbatus 'Coccineus'
Peony 'Francis Ortegot'

I read on the Perennial forum about a new red Echinacea coming out called 'Tomato Soup', and there is a new Coreopsis, which is red and yellow streaked called 'Redshift'.

Bonnie

I have
achillea "summer wine"
achillea "strawberry seduction"
Peony "karl rosenthal"
astlbe noid but bright red
hydrangea "first red"

I have only seen blooms on the astlbe, the others are new this year.They are all supposed to be reds, I'm patiently waiting to see how bright they are. I'll keep you posted as I find out if they are true reds.

I have red roses, lilies, 2 clematis, and 2 Nova Zembla Rhododendron (a little to the rose shade when it opens). Apart from that, I have some sidalcea rosanna (see link below) coming on in a plastic dinner tray, some Joe Pye Weed purchased for next year WS'ing.

You might like the sidalcea. The packet says 36" tall, and read somewhere on the web part shade. I spring sowed it, and it germinated quickly and well.

I only want red to brighten up a few spots, mostly I'm into yellows, blues, purples and whites.

If you like orange, you might like Siberian wallflower, a biennial that self-seeds, got that at Seeds Trust, it's a little like phlox, got 3+ feet tall, flopped some in the rains but stood back up fairly well. It made a huge splash of color early in the spring when nothing much is blooming and bloomed at least 3+ weeks. When it was mostly seedy, I cut it back, probably too hard, and now some are reblooming and are supposed to a little again in the fall.

Photo taken May 19 of this year.

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Here is a link that might be useful: Swallowtail seeds - Sidalcea rosanna

See, this is the problem I have with reds. Too many things that I consider dark pink, get listed as red. The sidalcea at the link, to me, is a perfect example, and the same with a lot of dianthus that are described as red.

What I want is a warm red, not a cool/blue toned red. Yeah, I know, I'm kind of picky, LOL!

Aliska, I do LOVE that Siberian wallflower though!

Bonnie

Monarda Jacob Kline (mine got nuked by the landscape team - it has a rather weedy look to it, but I liked it)

Lilium concolor strictum - my favorite red - a true fire-engine red. Mine doesn't always set viable seed, but if it does this year, I'll have some in another couple of months. Gardens North sells the seed, and it wintersows well.

Your Maltese Cross isn't red? Maybe I have a different plant. Here's what I have always considered Maltese Cross:

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and then I have Amaryllis (which is sorta hardy here, probably not there!)

(my camera doesn't do red very well...)

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Salvia Greggii:

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and...not perennial, but should self sow well: Shirley Poppies:

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Lisa

Lisa, I LOVE your reds!!!

Seeing that Maltese Cross with the Columbine makes me want to try WSing Lychnis again!

Which Yarrow is that with the Salvia? That is an awesome combination!

I tried a couple different poppies this year, but everytime I planted them out they died. I may have to try to direct sow those next time.

Thanks for posting those photos!

Bonnie

Bonnie,

I see your point, but in my view, it's the orange hue which invades the red. If we look at Lisa's photos for example, there is an orange hue in the Maltese Cross and in the Amaryllis. The Salvia Gregii on the other hand IS a beautiful red. (By the way Lisa, nice photo with the Achillea!)

Like Drippy says - a true fire engine red. YUM! I do have Jacob, given to me by my SIL last year so I'm just waiting on those. The lilies you speak of sound great so I'll be watching for those.

Aliska,
Your Siberian Wallflowers are great. I do have those and love the color. Mine will actually bloom the first year from seed and if I deadhead them, they will return the next year bigger and better but I don't think I have the height you have?! Mine reach a foot at most.

ishareflowers,

I'll have to look for more Achilleas. Did get the Cerise Queen last year and it is a red. I'd certainly like more of them for the butterflies.

You've just reminded me that I may have some Astilbes which might be red. Just waiting on them to bloom for the first time. Last year's wsn bloomers were pink and not red as I expected. Still really nice though and they certainly have a place in the gardens.

Thanks for the Penstemon suggestions Bonnie as well as the Geum. Those are two more great possibilities which can certainly be winter sown. I have some unknown Penstemons about to bloom in the gardens right now so you never know. Might be some real red in there.

As per the Crocosmia Lucifer, well a mature clump died two years ago and the ones winter sown the following winter also died. Just not meant to be.

Bonny, tiffy, all,

Some gorgeous reds there! If I want red, I want red red, that is being picky lol. I'm a wee bit disappointed in my Nova Zembla, but it should be a beauty anyway.

It's supposed to be the bottom pic of the sidalcea, says rosy red, and it looks bright red on my monitor. But I'll bet it will have more pink than I wanted.

I don't know what's with the wallflower, first time I grew them, started last year from seed the spring sow way, then dumped them in clumps in 16oz cups w/holes in good potting soil so the roots would just grow deeper.

Transplanted w/my bulb planter, and they laid low all summer and fall but got thicker. I feed my roses, maybe that affected them, nothing just for them.

This year they just shot up like a rocket and taller than I expected.

tiffy,if you want to see true reds,go to the cottage garden forum and search gottagarden-her red bed is awesome.
moonphase

I agree with tiffy that Maltese Cross has orange hue in it. I never think of it as red.
My Monarda 'Gardenerview Scarlet', Clematis 'Niobe' and Clematis 'Mme. Julia Correvon' are red:

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My Geum triflorum buds are red:
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I must say that we have great photographers here!! Isn't it nice how taking good pictures of our gardens has become a happy thing? All of your photos are fantastic Piti. The one of the Geum buds... WOW!!

Thanks for the suggestions. I already have a dozen Clematis, but we plan on placing a couple of arbours on the property in the next few years so I'm taking note. :O)

pinitimpinai, wow a Canon 40D on those buds. Did you use the 100mm Macro lens or another one? I gave my gdaughter one for graduabon from college, then loaned her my 70-200 2.8 to take some photos at a play, flash not allowed, lighting poor, she got some great, sharp pics with it from the balcony, but her arms got tired holding that lens for almost 3 hours and shooting continuously. Then I was asking her what settings she used, and she said f4 and ISO 1000. She shoots full manual, took a course in college, looks like you might shoot full manual, too. I don't dare do that yet. I said no, it goes 800 then 1600. Not on the 40D. It has ISO 1000.

Grandma has the discontiued 20D which does tend to blow the reds and only CS2, couldn't see spending the money to upgrade. She dl'ed a trial of lightbox & it was really neat. No wonder the Geum buds look so sharp, like the depth of field with just the front one in focus! But you obviously knew what you were doing there because it's not just the camera.

You used a Panasonic for Madam Julia Correzon last year. I have two of those clematis, one doing well, another not. I paired them with a White Dawn climber, evidently they don't do so well in our zone, alive but aren't doing much, always something disappointing to deal with.

lisah got nice pics with her Panasonic (I can read the exif if it is preserved sometimes like to check camera model and settings people use).

I didn't know Chicago was z6 now. The Arbor Day revised zone map still has me stuck in z5.

Sorry for going OT but just wanted to comment, glad the other poster made me want to look at those buds again, more closely this time, I don't always go looking for exif.

My red perennials - Daylilies, Monarda didyma, Aquilegia canadensis, and Lobelia cardinalis. Some other red natives that I am interested in buying or winter-sowing - Silene virginica, Ipomopsis rubra, Spigelia marilandica.

Interestingly, most of these are reported to be good Hummingbird plants!

Aliska: I have so missed my old panasonic camera. I dropped it on its head one too many times. I bought a new panasonic and I keep threatening to take it back. I've not been near as happy with it. I decided to take it out to the garden again on Sunday and try it out some more...the take back period is quickly closing.

I'm still not completely pleased with how my photos turned out, but this one (part of a series) turned out pretty good. I may yet give it a reprieve....

Tiffy,...it's not red, sorry!

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Lisa

lisa, I guess today is camera day :-). I don't miss my old one but know the feeling. It's so hard to choose the right camera, and some of the older, discontinued ones were classics that were even better in some ways than their upgraded counterparts. One example of that was the early Olympus C-UZ2???Z (can't remember that model offhand), one of their early ones with only about 1 or 2 megapixel photos, sharp as a tack and good zoom, never had one myself. But that is looking back, and even people with those cameras want ones that will take at least 5mp photos now.

I think your photos are excellent. For the oversaturated reds and yellows (which aren't that bad, just referred someone on my regular OGR forum to your poppy photo and the Geum, asking about cameras), you can turn the saturation down in your graphics editor if you think it is too hot (can't tell which one you use). You also ought to be able to turn it down in your camera menu.

Before giving up on it, since it obviously takes good quality images, maybe you need to learn some tricks and gain more experience. I was impressed that even though very red, you didn't blow the highlights on the poppy which you see so much of here; the details are excellent in that photo. You are using ISO 100. It did a pretty good job on the daylily even in part shade, but I usually use ISO 400 for that. There's usually more than one way to get the job done.

There is a feature you should have called exposure compensation. I had mine set on -2/3 for those wallflowers (use that any bright flowers esp white in bright sunlight). Still they are pretty bright, but I think I captured the true color, not one of my best photos for sure. Sometimes I forget to change my settings back when I've fiddled with them.

Some of those things take time, there is a forum where I learned everything I now know and have always had a camera since I was a kid, little tips and tricks for certain situations.

All that being said, at that image size, I don't think my much more (probably) expensive camera would have gotten them metered any better and sharp.

Practice, practice, practice. Maybe you can move up to shooting in aperture priority like I do, took awhile. With that, I can control what is called depth of field better which depends on the specific situation.

That geum photo has what is called shallow depth of field (DOF), which means only one thing in the photo is in focus; the rest is blurred. Intentionally. That effect is called bokeh. See, your camera got you that in some photos even on auto.

I think you deserve a pat on the back and would go further and say if you get lucky, your photos could win contests like a few of mine have. Which is not what I'm in it for.

It is frustrating at first to switch to a camera you are not used to. One more thing, then I'd better shut up. There are different light metering modes. You have yours automatically on pattern which is the same I use, but I can also choose 2 other ones, that's one area I'm weak in, metering right.

It looks like your flash went off on the daylily photo. If so, that would be considered fill flash to make up for the shadows. It says flash reserved. It says no strobe light returned in your poppy shot which to me means no flash. So see, your camera did the right thing if I am right. Sometimes you need flash outside in the daytime if there are shadows and even in bright sunlight on faces around noon where there are annoying shadows. Those I now avoid. There is something called the "golden" hours, about 1 hour after sunrise and 1 hour before sunset. That is when light conditions are optimal. But I shoot when I need to when I want even if the pros would have done something better.

Just wanted to encourage you to push harder and learn more. That will boost your confidence and give you consistently better photos, not just one lucky batch.

OMG Lisa!!!!!!!!!!!!! My jaw is on the floor. I'll come back when it's on my face again... WOWSERS!!!!

Tiffy....Thanks! I was pleased with it. However, that particular set of photos is the only one that turned out worth anything from that day. There's a series of three, but I haven't decided which was the best. I need to finish uploading them.

It was very bright daylight, probably 2 or so in the afternoon. Aliska was right, I rarely get good garden photos then.

Aliska, thanks for all the info. I need to print that out and study it some more. I actually took a photography class way, way, way back in high school. We mostly used black & white :) I had to learn all about that stuff, but it obviously didn't stick!

I will confess...I just use the auto setting. This camera is supposed to allow much more manual settings, but it's going to take me a lot more practice.

I don't use a graphics editor, at least normally. I've done a little with some other photos, but usually the garden ones are uploaded as is.

I have a friend who has been telling me I need to enter my photos into the County Fair. I haven't done it yet. I'll attach a link to my album. There's a lot of not very good stuff, but there's a few that aren't bad. The poppies just really captured my attention last year. I loved the crinkly textures as they were popping out of their pods.

I also have some photos in the Butterfly album I'm pretty pleased with too.

Here is a link that might be useful: Lisa's Garden Album

lisa, thanks for sharing your photos. I love the white-tailed dragonfly, never saw one before. That monarch I like better than any I have gotten so far, sharp as a tack and good composition. I have times when I don't do as well as I'd like, too, tilt too many photos or don't frame them well, sometimes don't nail the focus, and on and on.

I think you should enter some in the County Fair, just for the experience and satisfaction of it, whether you win or not. I'm not in it for money or making a name for myself and have deluged you with enough. It was nice to win a little money, but one of the things I do is if I get a good photo when I'm out, I can get cheap 8X10's, and if I think it might have meaning for people, just give them away, like community service, not to show off especially for some kind people who have invited me onto their property to photograph some neat things they have. Most seem to appreciate it, then worry they think I'm angling for something, not at all, just my way of sharing and thanking people who humor an old lady by letting me practice. Thanks for explaining why the graphics program info wasn't there, didn't consider that, simple, you didn't use one! I think Photobucket and other hosting sites automatically resize them.

Now you might want to try taking some night photos. That is really challenging, but one good photo makes it all worthwhile. I'm still no expert on that, always learning myself, and sometimes I am just plain wrong, don't presume to know it all because I certainly don't.

tiffy, I have a gazillion Clematis too. I paired Mme Julia Correvon with C. venosa violacea. I have not taken picture of them this year. Both Mme. & venosa violacea are exceptionally beautiful this year.
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aliska, Thank you very much for the compliments. It's my first dSLR. I do know my camera can do whole lot more than what I am capable of. Yes, those buds were taken with a 100mm Macro. I have a 70-200 f2.8 too, but it is way too heavy for me. I have used in on tripod only. I am questioning my sanity and wondering whether I should have bought an f4 instead.

Sorry, tiffy. We went OT here, didn't we?

Ahhhhh, but it became a true conversation as if we were all having a cup of coffee at the picnic table next to our gardens. :O)

Lisa, I visited your album and need to know the name of the Azalea on the second page because I want one. Along with the name, I need the hardiness zone. (I demand this information! LOL!) It is beautiful and has a spectacular colour for early season. Just bought a Northern Lights which is orange, but I'm looking for smaller flowers in the hue you have. Oh, and by the way, I love your photos! The Peonies... You should enter your photos in the fair. No doubt in my mind.

Hi Tiffy,

Papaver "Beauty of Livermere" Just incredible. Blooms for me together with my blue siberian irises and Euphorbia polychroma. Stunning combo.

Just wanted to say that my siberian wallflowers are blooming now!! They are about 12 " tall maybe less. My cheiranthus cheiri "Blood Red" (which might be a candidate for this post?) hasn't bloomed yet - doesn't even have buds. Maybe it won't flower till next year.

Also wanted to say how blown away I am by all those stunning photos in this post. Wish I could take photos like that ...

Marianne

pinitimpinai, try to make this quick, guess it wasn't. The praise to both you and lisa was genuine.

You did the right thing by getting the 70-200 2.8 imo, it is L glass and much more powerful in low light situations not sure if the f4 is L (memory), read a lot before I buy anything expensive. But having the 40D changes that somewhat with more ISO choices. Still that gives you even more power. At 1600 I start getting noise but usually doesn't show up in smallish prints. 3200 I only use if there is no other way to capture the photo, and that is even noisier, then sometimes forget to turn it back down.

With a tripod, you have to turn the IS off; maybe it works with it on anyway. And I only haul my tripod around when there is no other way because it is heavy and cumbersome and combined with that lens, a big load I use it with a monopod (or handhold), for that I can leave the IS on, didn't think of it myself, someone gave me that tip. I can handhold it for about an hour, but then I'm done, but I get more tilted photos with it I have to straighten because it is harder to handle. The only problem with the monopod is mine is sturdy but doesn't have a good way to rotate the camera from landscape to portrait mode, think you can on the lens with the collar?, but it came loose the one time I tried that so I either take it off the pod or turn the whole thing. Or get a better monopod than I did. I haven't used it for a long time glad I have it in my "arsenal" but have not gotten my money's worth out of that one.

My cheapie monopod collapses down, is light, has a wriststrap and much easier to carry when I have to walk any distance and will bear the weight of the camera and lens just fine.

I got the Sigma 105mm macro because I saw good photos with it and to save $$, renders great color, too, but I need at least a monopod for closeups with that, too, and it is very quirky. Don't use that one too often either, but glad I have it anyway. The Canon 100mm is better I think.

Congrats on the 40D! At some point, maybe. It has a much bigger lcd screen and other nice features, but I shoot at the highest resolution possible and RAW and 10 mp I don't have enough memory for, already shuffled a bunch of photos to backup to make more room for 8mp.

It's nice to go a little OT now and then unless it annoys others or breaks some rule. I like the chatting over tea analogy.

Oh, Tiffy, I have absolutely no idea what the name of that azalea is. That bush was here when I bought my house 10 years ago. That pic does not do it justice, it was gorgeous this year. (That was a pic I almost erased before posting the link to my album!)

Marianne: All I can say is take as many photos as possible and make good use of your zoom lens! The absolute joy of digital is being able to take a hundred pictures of one thing and being able to dump the 99 that didn't work. I just use a point and shoot, and I honestly 99% of the time use the auto setting. My first Panasonic had a 6 optical zoom. This new one only has 5, and I really miss that extra 1.

Pitimpinai, oooh, I love that clematis. Purple is my favorite color! I have several clematises, but I think somehow they mostly ended up dark purple. I would really like to get a large white one. A couple streets away from me, someone has one on their fence and I just drool every time it blooms.

Bonnie: If you're still following this! That yarrow I think is Moonshine...moonbeam? I love it. It's the only achillea I still have left in my garden. The others have all come and gone.

Did I miss any other questions? I think someone asked about the name of the salvia. I don't know, I'm sorry. I am VERY type B about that kinda stuff and I never keep track of names. I do well to remember the official name :) Everytime I post over at the daylily forum I have to begin my post with "I'm sorry I don't know the name of this ...I just want to share....or....look at my beautiful seeding...uh, I have no idea who the parents are!!" I always feel so inadequate when I have to admit that!

Aliska, I'm going to try to fiddle with some of the settings. I do enjoy taking photos. A friend of mine is raising her granddaughter and I am the official photographer. I keep a normal photobook with a tons of pictures in it, but since she was two I have been making books for her chronicling her year (This is the year I was two, these are my adventures when I was three...) Have you seen Shutterfly? I upload the pictures all year to there and then after her birthday I write the dialogue and pick the photos and presto, a hard bound book arrives. I have thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed doing that. I don't really have any memories of my early childhood, so I wanted to make sure she will always remember all the fun times we had. She loves reading the books. We used to read them as bedtime stories!

Uh....grab a cuppa tea, I'm really going off topic! (like I haven't been!) Here's one of my photos that I just love. It was a total accident. My nephew pointed out to me later that I had a "sports" setting on my camera :) But then I wouldn't have got this cool pic! We were at a tiny rodeo in Beaver Creek Colorado when I took this.

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I don't know anything about photography, but my favorite red flower that is easy to WS is lobelia cardinalis!

Tiffy, all this camera talk has got me in show and tell mode! I decided to take pity on your thread though and start a new post on the Gallery! I was getting ready to shut down my computer and just had to post one more pic!

Lisa

lisa, that's a neat accident there. I have a similar one from a wedding, a real screwup but we liked it anyway. That's great of you to keep a photojournal for your friend.

I looked at the main online processors and ended up with White House Custom Colour, have been very satisfied with them, only get prints so far and haven't ordered any for a long time. Sometimes for a batch of 4X6 prints, I just crop them the way I want and upload to Walgreens and pick them up there.

Several of those places are good, there was something I balked at about Shutterfly can't remember what it was, nothing big. It was hard to choose, but once I get started with one that is working well for me, I don't want to go through the hassle of changing. WHCC if I have any problem whatsoever or question, I can call them on their toll-free # and don't get put on hold very long if I do.

The camera store was charging me $5.95 for an 8X10, and WHCC charges $2. What a difference! Even Walgreens was charging more than $2 and I couldn't get matte finish, they may have it now, decided I like glossy now, colors seem more vibrant.

I'm going to try to be good today :-). But my tea is sitting here. You did say coffee first, my bad.

Nicole, I'm sure you'll be very please with the red when your Ipomopsis blooms.

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Ipomopsis aggregata Scarlet Gilia

Sharon