Insect Portraits

The warm sun yesterday afternoon brought out quite a few insects in the garden posing on leaves ready for a portrait. The Snail-killing fly Coremacera marginata only sips nectar or dew but the larvae prey on land snails. The first image is a focus stack (15 images Zerene stacker) the second image is a single shot, The Soldier Fly and Hawthorn Shieldbug are focus stacks, the rest are single-shot portraits. The last image is a new one for my list I think, Vulgichneumon saturatoris, with the white spot on the tip of the abdomen 

28th August Paxton Macrophotography

Yesterday was our second Macrophotography Day at Paxton on a very warm humid day. Having talked about the various techniques that could be used in the field (depending on camera models, type of image wanted visually and the intended use of the image), we spent the rest of the day on the reserve finding some models for our techniques.

 Image 1 (Green bottle) is a stack of Raw images using in-camera Bracketing and stacking in Zerene stacker.

 Images 2, 3, 4, and 5 are in-camera stacks producing a jpg image (Olympus OM-D EM5iii). 

Images 6-10 are single shots with a wide depth of field (1/250 sec F14) 

 Images 11-14 are set on Procapture (1/2000th f8) hoping to capture flight!! I was particularly please with the Spiked Shieldbug as I had never recorded how the wings unfold in Hemiptera before.

Early Morning Sharpenhoe

I was interested in the effect of shade, cloud and direct sunlight on the colours and appeal of images. Clouds covered the sun when we arrived at Sharpenhoe yesterday morning but these cleared as the sun came above the ridge. All single shots except image 10 which is a focus stack of 10 images.

Emerald - My Favourite Damselfly

The Emerald Damselfly is definitely my favourite Damselfly, especially the mature male when the blue pubescence develops fully. I spent an hour trying to capture that 'perfect' image with focus stacking or single images - not succeeding but a very enjoyable exercise.

Meet Misumena our Macrophotography Model

Yesterday the RPS and CCC Nature Groups held a very informative Macro workshop led by David Smith of OM-Systems. Although he had his own model, Frankie, the Ghost Mantis, I think Misumena 1 and Misumena 2, a couple of flower spiders, stole the show. This is M2 parading rather attractive dark green patches and stripes - excellent for hiding in Meadow Sweet flowers.  They can change colour (not sure of the timescale of the changes) and often those in Buttercups are bright yellow. 

These are mainly single shots at F13-F18 but the last two are an in-camera jpeg stack versus a stack done from Raws in Zerene stacker.