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.

In the Eye of a Grass Snake

Came eye-to-eye with this grass snake while hunting for mining bee nests in the meadow. Knowing they are harmless other than excreting a foul odour, I enjoyed photographing the snake while it sampled the air with the tongue. I even had time to do a focus stack of it (last two images) before it disappeared into longer grass.

Focus-stacked Mosses, Lichens and Flies

We have traded in our Olympus OM-D EM-1 mark ii for another 2nd hand EM-1 mark iii as it has a few very useful features including dedicated exposure compensation and the ability to do an in-camera stack of 15 rather than 9 images. Here a few in-camera stacks of mosses and lichens in our churchyard and a couple of flies. The last image is stacked in the computer with Zerene stacker from the 15 RAW images processed with DxO PureRaw3; this gives a lot more detail than the in-camera jpeg and is obviously the best method for a quality images but the in-camera stacks are excellent for a quick image

Lichens at RPSB Sandy

As often happens when I am out with my camera, I got fixated on the variety of lichens growing on the sandy soils in the reserve. Not great quality images as they are all very small and these in-camera stacks don't give enough depth of field in most cases as it is restricted to 8 shots. I will return and try again taking 20+ stacks to process in the computer. There were lots of ladybirds and very very small spiders (Mangora acalypha)

Pasque Flowers Beginning at Royston Heath

The Pasque flowers are just beginning to flower - a bit later than some years but will probably be best around Easter as their name suggests. They are very short so quite a challenge to photograph plus a stiff breeze today. Most are Focus stacks using Fuji X100V and Raynox 250 close-up lens. I find this a very useful high quality combination for flower photography. We found one very small bee - a Lasioglossum species