Wondering why it is I cant seem to get a GOOD clear shot of any of the TRUE red flowers..especilly Dahlias..I try and try..and even roses are hard..is there some kind of a speciaL trick to the colour of red as compared to other colours? I took some great shots today and NONE of them are sharp and clear enough to post...Any suggestions?

Your not really seeing the red in the flower. Its the chimical conpostiton of the plant that allows you to see the reflected lite of the specstrom that represents that color of visible lite. Are you using a Digital or film?

Yes, am using Nikon DIgital...got some ideas?

It has been a problem for a long time for digital to capture true red. Now with the past upgrades in ccd technology there has been a lot of improvement. You may be able to adjust the absorption via settings. What is the mode and its year.
I will do some checking on that model and see if I can come up with a way to help with the problems. In some cases a good polarizer or filter can help.

I think you would get better results on an overcast day.

Possible Robert but the main issue is that charged coupling array's have a problem with certain colors.

I think that it is perfectly reasonable to guess that the CCD would have a less-than-flat sensitivity distribution for the range of visible light frequencies.

IT was an overcast day today and it happened anyway. I have a Nikon Coolpix digital camera, it is new, bought it four months ago. It hates red I guess..lol

Try bracketing your exposure, that is take one at normal exposure one slightly overexposed and one slightly underexposed. Most modern cameras can do this automatically via the menu system. Which model Nikon do you have?

Nikon Coolpix E4800

Try the scene modes and the best shot feature Verena.

I saw many flowers numeric photos with a large red saturation on the site. I think that cams are initially adjusted like that because the potential buyers like the red color (Example). It's just flattering IMO. More expensive is the camera, less is the saturation in the red... :-(
With my Minolta Dimage A2, I tried to take a red flower in 'jpg' format and then in 'raw' format. There is a big difference, though the A2 is expensive!!!
Some cams have a color saturation adjustment. I don't know if the Nikon Coopic 4800 got one...

Nikon has had quite a few complaints about the (lack of) red saturation in their Coolpix digital cameras over the years. That is one of the reasons I bought a Fuji, after doing a bit of research on the net.

I just looked at Pierre's example (above) and it looks like the camrea is recording too much blue. I lowered the blue content, ant the red became more natural.

Each color has a different wave length and a different focal depth. It my guess that the cameras are set to capture the more common lower and middle colors and when you try to focus on bright reds from the upper end of the spectrum, the sensors just can't handle it. Try focusing on some other color nearby at the same depth then move the camera over to the flower. Change your f-stop to a higher number to increase your depth of field. I have the same problem with my KonicaMinolta DiMAGE A200.
Russ

With your Dimage A200??? I'm estonished! I had no problem with my Ladybird... (Dimage A2), but I must desaturate a bit (-20% in the red, with PS)