Arizona Wildflowers

UPDATE: HERE IS THE INFO ABOUT WILDFLOWER SESSIONS COMING UP!

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN TO READ ABOUT THE TWO LOCATIONS.

PLEASE FILL OUT THE FORM TO SIGN UP FOR A WILDFLOWER PHOTO SESSION:

ZANJERO LOCATION - This is a water retention area in Gilbert, Arizona. It’s one of the only places I can find within the metro area that has wildflowers. It is a gooooood place for photos. Some of the things that are good about it: EASY parking, close to the freeway so it’s easy to get to, has a LOT of variety for backgrounds, there are almost no people there so you don’t have to worry about people being in the backgrounds of your photos. Right now it has a TON of wildflowers!!!! Soooooo many more than last year.

The bad things about this place: some of the plants are thorny/sticky and you can get goat burrs in your shoes, so you should definitely not wear open toed shoes.

VISTA DEL ORO AND THE BEELINE HWY: Here is the pindrop for this location. Don’t be alarmed by dry and unpretty this place looks on Google streetview. Right now it is green and GORGEOUS and there are SO many different kinds of wildflowers!

https://goo.gl/maps/zbEr8sHzCKdA5jJk9

Victoria and her daughter met up with me one early evening last April in 2022 for photos in the wildflowers. I absolutely loved how these turned out, though in the almost year since then I have learned more photo editing techniques and I have bought more editing tools for Photoshop, so I kind of want to go back over these and edit them again. We had this field of flowers all to our selves and it was so cute to watch how Vicki’s daughter picked the purple and yellow wildflowers and gave them to her mom.

With all the rain we have had in the last couple months this past winter, I really am so excited about our prospects for amazing wildflowers and even super blooms in Arizona. I’ve gone out searching and found flowers around South Mountain, Usery, and next up I will be exploring Picacho Peak.

I will be announcing Wildflower photo sessions and mini sessions as soon as I figure out when and where to go! If you would like to hear more about those, please subscribe to my newsletter in the form below the photos! They are perfect for engagement photos, maternity, mommy and me, and family photos.

Agritopia Orchard

I first met Erin at an ultimate frisbee game at a park in Tempe. She was there to watch her boyfriend Ryan play ultimate and I was there to watch my boyfriend Ryan play ultimate. It was soon after my spinal fusion surgery, when I couldn’t play ultimate. (Thankfully my spine got much better after surgery and I eventually was able to play my beloved sport again.) I had a really good time chatting with her and getting to know her!

Fast forward some years later and Erin and Ryan are married with two little kids!

We met up at Agritopia at the peach and citrus orchards for some holiday photos. I loved how their family portraits turned out!

If you want photos at Agritopia, reach out to me on my contact page here. The Agritopia orchards have very limited availability (more limited than it used to be) so if you are interested, we have to sign up right when spots become available. Usually there are some spots in September, October, and November and some very limited spots available when the peach trees are in bloom in early February.

Agritopia sunflowers

I met up with Alice and her Little Sister Lila at the gorgeous sunflower fields at Agritopia one early evening in late July, after Arizona got a ton of summer rain. I know Alice from playing ultimate frisbee at local pick up games. It was the first time I had met Lila, but now I follow her on social media and know that she does roller derby (which seems very cool to me!)

We were warned to be careful because the farm fields were flooded and muddy due to recent monsoon storms. If you scroll down a little you will see Sarah, who I think is a farm manager at Agritopia, holding a huge bouquet of sunflowers that she had just cut. She shared all those gorgeous sunflowers with Alice and Lila and me.

Thanks for meeting up with me for sunflower photos, Alice and Lila!

Want sunflower photos for yourself? I am always on the look out for sunflower fields, and right now I have sessions available in October 2022 at Rocker 7 Farm Patch in Buckeye, Arizona. More info about that here: SUNFLOWER PHOTOS AT ROCKER 7 FARM.

Photography equipment used:

Canon 5D, Canon 1.2 prime lens, 43 inch gold reflector, Adobe Photoshop for editing.

Are you looking for a photographer so that you can get photos at Agritopia? All year long photographers and their clients can walk around Agritopia to get photos, after buying a location permit. Agritopia also gives photographers a chance to purchase permits to photograph in their peach orchards. Those are usually available in September, October, and November and sometimes in the spring. Permits for the pink peach blossoms are available in February. Some years permits are available for the sunflower fields.

Fill out this form if you would like me to photograph you at Agritopia!

Rocker 7 Farm Patch Sunflower Portraits

FILL OUT THIS FORM IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN BEING NOTIFIED WHEN FALL 2022 SUNFLOWER SHOOTS ARE ANNOUNCED! (Click Sunflowers for sunflower shoot info or Other photo shoot if you are interested in something else.)

Rocker 7 Farm Patch is a magical place - acres of sunflowers under wide open skies with the Estrella and White Tank Mountains in the distance. You drive out into the country and down a dirt road to the parking lot of the farm. Admission is only $6 and then there are acres of sunflowers, a pumpkin patch, and fields of cotton and maize to wander through.

I’ve now photographed at Rocker 7 Farm Patch for two years in a row, in Fall 2020 and Fall 2021 and I plan to photograph there this October and November in 2022 when the sunflowers are in bloom.

This family was a delight to photograph and I love how their images turned out. Something to know about these photos as you scroll through is that most of them actually had people in the backgrounds. I photoshopped the people out of the images. If you are wanting to experience the sunflowers with less crowds, I recommend going on a Thursday or Friday. When I went on those days, we pretty much had the place to ourselves!