If you want to try your hand at photographing odonates, I recommend starting with four-spotted skimmers. This medium sized (2-3″) dragonfly often returns to the same perch again and again after each hunting foray. It also generally chooses perch at the tops (ends) of branches or other stalks. Lastly, it is not particularly skittish and thus is relatively easy to approach closely. All of this makes four-spotted skimmers easy… to photograph.
If you want to increase your levels of frustration, I recommend trying to photograph the sedge sprite (and a number of other small damselflies). These critters are small (about 1- 1.5″ long) and slender. They spend most of their time low down in the vegetation and seem to flit about at random. All of this makes sedge sprites (and their ilk) hard… to photograph.
Every once in a while I find myself on the wrong side of an ode in terms of the light. Sometimes when this happens, the silhouette neuron in my brain goes off. This allows me to make something different… photographically.
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I made the photograph of the iris as I headed back towards home. The sun, which by 6:30 was relatively low in the sky, had gone behind the clouds making for some nice light. The irises are nearing the end of their season so I doubt that there will be too many more chances to photograph them… until next summer.