Taking brilliant flower photos! 
You don’t need to have a very high end camera to take brilliant flower photographs. What you need is a camera which allows manual adjustment of aperture, shutter speed and film speed (This is true for any type of photography).  Here are some tips I learned in a few sessions of flower photography!

0. Get a digital camera which allows manual adjustment of all controls - aperture, film speed, shutter speed, white balance etc. I use canon S3 IS which is not an SLR but still good enough.

1. Most important thing is to find the best angle, the angle from which flower looks most attractive. For this you need to look around the flower before taking the shot! Typically we tend to take the photo looking down which may not capture the true beauty.

2. When you compose your shot by varying aperture etc. ensure that the true colors are captured. If you are shooting in direct sunlight, the flowers may look white washed! So adjust various parameters ensuring that the true colors are seen on the LCD preview.

3. Ensure that the flower covers the entire photo. You are photographing a flower and want it to be the primary focus! You may have to use zoom for this. So get a camera which offers atleast 10x zoom.

4. Manipulate the background. You can place a white or black sheet behind the flowers. If that is not possible, edit the photo background later in photoshop.

5. Use a tripod! Using a tripod guarantees that the photo is sharp. Even a small handshake can make the photos appear blurred(This is true for any photography, but in flower photography there is nothing that prevents you from using a tripod!).

6. In direct sunlight, I found that using shutter speed priority mode with 1/250 speed gives good results. When you are not using tripod, ensure that you take photos at higher speeds.

7. Sometimes it makes sense to break the above rules. For example, if there is something more interesting than the flower, make flower the secondary focus.  Sometimes a flower in motion may be more interesting than a stationary one. Use your instinct!

For any camera, there is a set of must have accessories. Get it! For Canon S3 IS, I found this.