photoartflightEastern Forktail Damselfly – 9 image Focus Stack
Posted on July 8, 2021
I am going through backup Hard Drives clearing out files not needed to clear up some of my storage space. I found this image of an Male Eastern Forktail Damselfly covered with the raindrops after a heavy rain. I thought it looked interesting with the heavy amount of raindrops. I was using a Sigma 150mm macro lens with a 1.4X Teleconverter on a Canon 1D MkIV. To get more in focus but still keep a soft uncluttered background I was shooting with my aperture @ f/4.5. I shot 9 images along the Damselfly and the water drops . Then loaded them into 1 layered Photoshop file to blend into my final image. Luckily the Damselfly did not move as I was photographing it. The 2nd image is a Immature Female Eastern Forktail Damselfly shot at the same session as the Featured Image.
Lady Bug Working A Leaf
Posted on October 18, 2016
I found this Lady Bug wandering all over this plant at Davidsons Mill Pond. A lot of the time it was partially hidden under leaves of the plant. Waiting for it to work towards the top of the plant, I was able to get a few shots before it disappeared .
Halloween Pennant Covered with Dew
Posted on September 18, 2016
We went to Davidsons Mill Pond Park to look for dragonflies and what ever else we could find. I have looked for dragonflies early in the morning covered with dew for years, but have not found any so far. To our surprise we found one on this morning. Unfortunately it was very windy plus in the shade. It was not warm enough for the Halloween Pennant to fly, so we had a great photo subject that was not going anywhere for a while. Being in the shade the light was terrible and with the wind it was blowing back and forth. I had to raise the ISO to 2000 and still only had a shutter speed of 1/125th sec @ f/8 with a 150mm Sigma macro. Hand holding the camera, I tried shooting quite a few series of different focus points to combine later in a stacked photoshop file with sharpest ones to combine for one sharp image. I shot quite a few bursts as it was blowing around. Being late in the season this dragonfly showed a lot of wear, damaged wings, pieces missing, etc. The one wing was even bent at an odd angle so I left that section with a little softer focus. With the way the wind was blowing I was surprised I got as much as I did. Not perfect but it was still fun to try.
Update – Bee Fly, Bombylius major
Posted on April 19, 2015
We found this bug on a window screen and thought it was interesting. We were not sure what kind it is, but I thought I should take some shots of it. We finally found out what it is, a Bee Fly, Bombylius major. These are shot at approximately 2X magnification. It almost looked a little “mean” and had a “cool” fuzzy look for some macro shots. It has the body of a bee and a face of a mosquito.
Some comments I found online:
“A curious flying insect which was about 10mm long, hairy, beige/brown coloured, triangular in shape with a long snout which had the ability of flying backwards.”
“Approx. 1 cm long, wing span twice body length, mix of light brown and black, teardrop shaped, hovers and darts at leaves and dead twigs, long spear-like proboscis approx half body length apparently non retractable.”
“If I was to describe it compared to other animals it was a cross between a bee, a golden mole and a narwhal – but that sounds really silly.”.
photoartflight 