Here are a series of Flickr albums containing many of the photographs I have posted on social media since 2016. All the photographs are mine, although not all the plants belong to me (which should be obvious from the filename).
The albums are arranged in three sections: cacti, other succulents, and collections (eg, botanical gardens, private collections). Within the first two I have created a rudimentary classification because although it is not essential to understand taxonomy it can be helpful to know which cactus belongs to which subfamily and which succulent sit in which botanical family. For one thing, it can help you identify plants more easily.
The albums are not intended to help you identify your plant as you have to remember that, particularly with cacti, there is a great deal of variation within some species. The names shown are mostly correct according to The Plant List because I check all my plants against this online database and I have amended the file names of many of the photographs I had previously shot.
Technical stuff
Most of the photographs were taken on my smartphone (Samsung Galaxy S7 and more recently an iPhone 12 and 16) but others, including the more artistic ones, were taken either on an Olympus OM-D or a Canon 5D Mk III.
The Samsung photographs were shot square whereas the others have been cropped for use on social media.
If you want to use any of them please get in touch and I will send you a high-resolution version.
Personal preferences
For the most part, I don’t like cacti and succulents shot against a black background as it looks gloomy and sterile and treats the plants as botanical specimens. I much prefer to see plants photographed in situ in a collection but this can be more difficult to achieve successfully and I realise that many of my photographs could be improved upon.
I have tended to photograph plants in flower, particularly cacti, as this is what most people are attracted to on social media. Cacti are generally pretty easy to photograph but succulents are trickier as the plants are more spread out and are harder to get in focus.
Photographs
Cactaceae
Other succulents
Collections