Insect Photo Show and Tell

[Mike Spinak]

It is clear from the posts in this forum, so far, that we have some very good insect photographers, here.

Insect photography is a weak spot in my close up photography. I've photographed a little over a dozen species of butterflies, a few skippers and moths, a score or so species of dragonflies, some bees and wasps, ladybugs, ants, and a few other common types of insects. But, overall, insects are way under-represented in my close up photography. Further, most of the insect photos I have are among my less inspired shots.

I'd like to change this. I'd like to bring insect photography more fully into my nature photography, overall. However, I don't know what I'm doing. Even though I know that there's a huge variety and density of insects around, I can't seem to find much. I don't know where or how to look for them. And when I find them, I don't have a good enough understanding of their lives, their behaviors, and so on, to make consistently engaging pictures of them. Nor do I know how to approach them and interact with them when photographing them.

I was thinking that a good way for me (and others, too) to learn would be to see each other's insect photos, and read your detailed descriptions about the photos: how you found them, how you approached them, what you had in mind for your photo of them, what you did to make your vision a reality, etc.

===========================

I'll start with a picture from this past Sunday, one of my few decent insect pictures:

I went to a butterfly garden in Coyote Hills Regional Park (in the Southern part of California's "Bay Area"). This butterfly garden is open, so that butterflies may come and go as they please. The superintendent grows plants that butterflies like, keeps some fountains running, and then leaves the rest up to the butterflies.

I actually went there to photograph rufous hummingbirds (Selasphorous rufus), not butterflies. As I was wandering around, my photo buddy and I noticed a monarch caterpillar on the shaded back of a purple, cardboard sign for Mexican sage (Salvia leucantha). After seeing the caterpillar, and determining that its placement on the purple sign did not make an appealing photograph for us, we noticed that there was also a chrysalis on the shaded back of the sign. Again, the placement on the purple sign made the shot unappealing, for us, and so we started hunting around for rufous hummingbirds. We had no idea whether the butterfly would be emerging from the coccoon in minutes or days.

As we made the rounds, we came by the sign, again, a few minutes later, and saw that the Monarch butterfly was just finishing emerging from its coccoon. As we watched, it crawled on its trembling legs from the back of the sign to the sunny edge of the sign, and began to straighten its wings.

It was really just dumb luck that we found this newborn monarch butterfly... though this sort of luck is not infrequent, because I go out looking for photo opportunities almost daily.

We both realized the great opportunity, before us. This little fellow needed to straighten and dry his soft, wrinkled new wings, and wouldn't be able to fly for a while. He was in somewhat of a stupor, exhausted from the effort of breaking out of the coccoon, and so he made no efforts to flee. Thus, it would be possible to get very close shots of a live monarch.

I set up my camera and tripod. I put on a 180 mm macro lens, with a 25 mm extension tube and a 1.4x teleconverter. I tried to be as non-stressing as possible for this little fellow... to the degree possible, when setting up a camera and lens inches away from it.

My initial thinking, as I was setting up, was that my main desire was to get a picture of the wing scales in a pristine state. They don't stay pristine for very long, and so pictures of such unsullied wings are hard to get. There were also some compositional constraints: he was standing on a purple cardboard sign, and I didn't want that in my picture; and behind him, above his wings, was an orange blur (through the viewfinder) which I didn't like, and wanted to exclude from my picture. So, certain aspects of my composition were influenced by these.

Once I got to see through the viewfinder, other characteristics also caught my interest. I wanted to show the soft, wet, still-light-colored veins in the wings, and I wanted to show the wrinkles in the not-yet-flat wings. I was somewhat limited in how far back on the wings I could show these, because the wings became more ruffled with wrinkles toward the back edge, and it was not possible to get this entirely within the depth of field. So, I decided to frame only the front of the wings, hinting at the greater wrinkles beyond, and thereby also make it more of a portrait of the monarch's head and thorax. I composed so that the monarch's pattern gave a sense of sweeping back dramatically, hinting at the full wings beyond, without showing them; and also so that there was empahsis on the monarch's pattern, with the pattern bringing attention to the not-yet-fully-formed look of the veins in the wings.

Then I tried to take the picture. This was complicated by the fact that conditions were very windy. The little one was blowing all over the place, barely holding on. I was trying to quickly re-compose, every time the wind stopped blowing for a second. I took lots of shots, to get the best chance I could that one or more would not be ruined by wind.

This shot was taken at f/18, 1/15th of a second, manual focused and manually exposed, with a tripod and cable release, with the mirror locked.

I like this picture, and I particularly like that the subject matter of the still-not-ready-to-fly young wings are something I haven't seen, before. I am wondering whether the picture would be improved if I slightly lightened the background, to bring greater contrast against the dark parts of the monarch's body.

===========================

Please share your own insect photos, and stories of how you made them.

Thanks.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Josh Liechty]

Mike, you've got a very good idea for a topic, and it is already at a great start with the info you've posted; I hope it only gets better with time as other members share their experiences as well.

The first time I attempted butterfly shooting seriously was at the White River Gardens in Indianapolis, IN. The butterflies are kept in a spacious, warm, and very humid greenhouse-like room (how I'd love to be near an outdoor butterfly garden like the one you were at). In my inexperience, I thought the solution was to flash the heck out of everything. The i-TTL pre-flashes didn't seem to bother the butterflies, but the shadows tended to be very harsh because all I had for diffusion was the standard white plastic dome used for bounce flash. A Lumiquest mini-softbox might solve this, but I'd like to hear advice from experienced macro photographers before throwing more gear at the problem.

This butterfly was resting on a leaf in the photo below, taken at 1/200 s and f/10 with a Tamron 90mm macro and flash mounted on a Kirk macro flash bracket. More depth of field is needed; I chose apertures around f/11 because that was supposedly the point of maximum resolution with this particular lens. However, I tested the resolution later and found that I was happy with the results up to f/22, with f/32 still ok if needed (finding one's equipment's limitations is highly recommended, particularly before taking it out in the field).

 

[Rob.Martin]

Here's a few

Not as good as the ones preceeding, but my lame attempts are here . .

http://www.pbase.com/lecter/butterflies or on www.1ds.com

 

[Sean DeMerchant]

Further, most of the insect photos I have are among my less inspired shots.

Interesting comment. One of the things I love about shooting arthropods (includes insects, arachnids, crustaceans, ...) is their incredible alien beauty. Their behavior is so alien to our own as they could in general care less about us (excepting some mosquito species, biting flies [vampire flies ;o)], ...). Their bodies coincide with a large amount of the more outlandish artwork out there (horror like H. R. Gieger's Alien to abstract art). I love looking at them and watching their behaviors.

Have you spent much time with them and watching?

I'd like to change this. I'd like to bring insect photography more fully into my nature photography, overall.

Interestingly in other less serious forums (more social than technical) I have seen that insect photography is a natural extension of shooting flowers, and overcoming aversion to arthropods through the discovery of their beauty by people. While I cannot document this, I have seen it happen a dozen times that I noticed (it happened to me too ;o). One finds them on flowers all the time and bees or flies start as a natural extension to making more interesting compositions. Then, they can become an obsession unto themselves.

I find interacting with bees incredibly intimate requiring the softest gentle motions and no limits on personal space. It is amazing to let a bee land on your hand and then ever so gently shake it off so you can focus on continuing to shoot. I suspect the bees feelings are rather different, but it is my feelings that affect my actions.

Like chatting with a ladybird/ladybug (truthfully a beetle and not a bug or bird) that that blade of grass was too wavy and would you please stay on a more stable platform:

Here I was shooting f/11 @ 1/200 @ ISO 100 with manual focus at 1:1 and got sick of chasing the ladybug about the grass so I grabbed it and it started looking in the crack between my little finger and ring finger as it lookefed for food while occassionally looking up so I could capture its head and antennae in the shot.

This is a mild crop to balance the lines of the image and body energy of the bug, but it is adequate for a decent but not great 8x10 or 8x12 inch print. I say adequate as the 1/200 second exposure created blur trails in the specular highlights and I want it sharper. But after after a dozen or so shots my hand holding the camera is only so steady one handed with the XT, 100 mm macro, and 550-EX balanced in it. Perhaps a larger better balanced body would help.

When I had shot enough, I tossed my hand in the air and off it flew (actually, my one handed shooting was getting unsteady).

However, I don't know what I'm doing. Even though I know that there's a huge variety and density of insects around, I can't seem to find much. I don't know where or how to look for them.

As a near-sighted glasses wearer I can tell you the first trick to finding insects is to not look for them. Without my glasses at 10 meters a face is a blob. If the human shaped blob waves, I smile and wave back.

Insects are similarly hard to see for clear sighted people. You will not find them by looking for them. A spider on a blade of grass at 3 meters does not look like a spider. A bee on a daisy at 4 meters does not look like a bee. In both cases they are dark round shaped blurs.

The secret to seeing insects is not to look for them. Instead you need to look for what insects look like at a distance.

Some ideas:

1) Photograph, learn the names of, and memorize the shapes of the plants around you. Take clinical botanical images (or artsy if you like) of the plants around and learn to feel their shape. Then, when you look for insects, you do not look for insects, you look for plants that feel improperly shaped. Sometimes it is a fallen piece of plant (another plants leaf, petal, sepal, ...), and sometimes it is an insect.

My point here is that insects do not look like insects past arms reach. They are naturally camouflaged and finding them is learning to see their camouflage rather than seeing them. Hence, if you know what a plant looks like at 3 meters, then you can spot deformities. Sometimes they will be deformities in the plant, other times they will be parts of other plants, and other times it will be an insect.

I will try to remember to shoot some examples of this and false positives as it is an excellent technical topic if a touch artistically dull.

2) Look for motion. Most of your retina is tuned to detect motion rather than detail. We may have a 150 degree or more arc of vision, but we only have a 5 degree (or is it 2 degree, I forget) arc of sharp vision. This steps back to the distribution of rods and cones in the human visual system and how our vision works.

Sometimes motion will be the breeze, other times motion will be a bee, a wasp, a beetle, and etcetera landing on a plant causing it to sway.

3) Get close and watch. There are some insanely amazing looking insects called hoppers. You have likely felt a hundred thousand or more. Sadly, since they are often less than a centimeter long, you have rubbed the itch and found a gooey mess on your fingertip.

4) Watch the same things over and over. This goes back to step 1) which relates to learning to see what your are seeing so you can easily spot when it differs. Get close and develop a feeling/intuition for what you see.

5) Let some of your yard grow wild. Whatever non-noxious species that grow should be left to grow. This attracts insects and makes them easier to find.

6) Many insect species gain energy from direct insolation (incident sunlight) and are more active in direct sun and warmer weather. Look for insects on still cloudy days. When insects have less energy, they move slower and are easier targets. If it gets windy though, then they tend to bunk down and hide on the undersides of leaves and become hard to find. Again, practice and knowing what you are seeing or should expect to see helps.

This also ties in leaving your tripod at home and using flash. 1/200 seconds @ f/11 @ ISO 100 on a cloudy day makes for a very dark image without flash. And f/11 may yield 3 mm of DoF if you have low standards near 1:1. Truth be told, for my tastes. at 1:1 on a 1.6 crop DSLR a 100 lens yields less than 1 mm of DoF (I prefer smaller than standard blur circles for acceptable sharpness). At f/2.8 and ISO 1600+ sensor noise will likely dominate anything you have sharp in your 0.6 mm of barely sharp DoF region.

So, unless your subject is incredibly still and not scared off by your tripod leg shaking the plant it is on you are out of luck. I have never heard of people getting past 1:1 with live and active subjects with a tripod (though I would love to see examples if anyone knows of any).

7) Go to the library or online and read on up the species that interest you. What plants do they like? What species do they prey on? What time of year is best? Did you know that spiders are less common in the PNW during late summer due to the drier weather? And this is when they are are most commonly visible to most people in my region. Did you know that orb weavers (concentric ring style web weavers) are the least common type of spider in most of the world? You can get more spider info here.

8) Use flash. At 1:1 your flash will be larger than the subject so the light will be soft (imagine using a 18x12 foot softbox to shoot a car). This lets you chase moving subjects. The odds of you ever getting a shot of a flying bee using a tripod and macro focussing rail is something close to the odds of winning the lottery. It can be done, but it is hard.

9) Some species stay out past dusk but slow down. Some bumble bee species stay out past sunset, use their slowing down to your advantage.

10) Make a killing jar (rubbing alcohol soaked newspaper in the bottom of a glass jar) and capture and kill them. Stick them on a pin and use studio methods. Digital methods can enhance DoF while retaining sharpness for large prints by this method. Some may object to this, but entomologists do this regularly as many species can only be identified under a microscope. And half a dozen butterflies in a glass case looks beautiful on a wall. Mind you, I favor shooting live ones, but that is more about environment than ethics.

11) Capture, refridgerate/cool, and then release the specifimen before an already set up shot with tripod at the ready. Some may say it is inhumane, but then so is cold weather coming down from the arctic.

The humane variation on this I already noted, use flash on a cool/cold day.

12) Study the creatures and learn where to stalk them.

I could go on, but in the end I am a mathematician trained in computer visoin who programs computers and I am still learning (and loving doing it ). And none of these items is the answer, just a list of things that have worked for me.

 

[Sean DeMerchant]

As I just lost the rest of my reply (too long and I lost the copy buffer, I will continue later).

good night,

Sean

 

[Ray West]

Sean,
remember you can outrun a wasp, but you can't outrun a bee.

I hope you know if you are allergic to bee/wasp stings, a single sting can kill some people. Perhaps it may pay you to carry antihistamine tablets. (NB I am not prescribing any medicines, but it would be wise for you to check into this)

Best wishes,

 

[Michael Brown]

Wonderful thoughts/discussions in this thread!

I have personally been working on a project of mine over the past 3 years called the "In Their World" series.
It focuses in on the beauty of a insect's world, and just how they may view it themselves.
Less documentary or details of the insect and their surroundings, and a bit more on the artistic flavor while shooting.

I do prefer to shoot in natural light, maybe using reflectors and mirrors when needed.
Much of the time, I will also shoot at the other end of macro, ..... meaning that I am not after a huge amount of details, focusing mainly on the light and the composition and shooting wide open.
Also, many times I will simply sit in a area where they are known to be, ... and wait.
I will not hesitate to sit inside or underneath a large clump of shrubs or tall grass, waiting, ... and then they will usually come to me.
Usually, I will spot many of the insects while looking through the macro and 2x teleconverter.
The way that my eyes are now, ...... well, if you are now at least 50 years of age, ..... you might already know!!!

And yes, ... the world of insects pretty much came to me in my photography while shooting flowers.
I was never interested in them until I bought that first macro, ... and it has been a wild and wonderful ride since!

Assassin Bug - Nymph

Unknown

 

[Sean DeMerchant]

Sean,
remember you can outrun a wasp, but you can't outrun a bee.

I hope you know if you are allergic to bee/wasp stings, a single sting can kill some people. Perhaps it may pay you to carry antihistamine tablets. (NB I am not prescribing any medicines, but it would be wise for you to check into this)

Best wishes,

Thanks Ray,

I have never had a problem with stings (could in the future) and am far more afraid of penicillin or sulfa antibiotics. But that is a good thing to be aware of.

Last wasp sting I had was 20+ years ago when I got 36 stings stepping on a mud wasp nest.

Last bee sting I had was last fall while mowing. The mower must have hit her and upset here and she stung my ear. I can remember getting insidel looking at the venom sacks in the mirror amazed at how HUGE they looked and thinking it would make a great photo. Then I found a piece of cardboard and flicked it out (never pull them out as this injects more venom). Never could find the venom sacks and stinger after that as they only looked huge in my ear.

I should also note that I do not photograph their homes, just their eating/foraging activities. Bees and wasps can get aggressive to humans when you get too close to their homes. I had to spray a yellow jacket the other day for buidling a nest in the mowers shed and I waited until direct sunlight was gone before opening the shed to spray (I had spotted the wasp entering earlier in the day).

From what I have read and experienced, unless you hurt them while they are out hunting/foraging wasps/bees do not care about you. This brings to mind a couple of tricks.

1) When a bee circles you away from its nest it is not an aggressive move. Instead, they are circling you to re-establish their sense of direction as a large creature just changed the shape of the universe. People often get stung by freaking out when a bee makes this directional move. The freaking person then, moves, the bee does it again to reorient as you just changed the universe again, and eventually you hurt the bee and it hurts you back.

2) Avoid scents (flower smelling hair gel, perfume, cologne, ....) as this at times attracts bees.

Another unmentioned partly idea for shooting insects is baiting them. I favor using an insect garden, but people have put out plates of food (fruit). I have heard of others using sugar water doped with rum to dope up their subjects to make them compliant. I have similarly heard of rum doped fruit. I have not tried these.

enjoy,

Sean

 

[Mike Spinak]

Josh,

In my inexperience, I thought the solution was to flash the heck out of everything.

At times, this can be the only solution, or even the most desirable solution, but, as you have seen, it can change the qualities of the light in ways that are not always desired.

I'd like to hear advice from experienced macro photographers before throwing more gear at the problem.

There are many possible techniques for acheiving softer lighting, each suitable in some situations but not others.

Was the butterfly room windless, or nearly so? If yes, then... if also the butterflies were fairly still... ( perhaps a longer exposure without flash could have been possible.

If I felt the need for flash, and wanted it to look soft, I likely would have tried to put the flash on a cable, with a big diffuser on it, and aimed it at a non-front-lit angle, with a nearby reflector to softly bounce some light onto the butterfly at a second angle. I would try to adjust the ratio of flash to natural light to be just enough flash for the shutter speed and aperture necessary, while trying to maintain use of as much of the existing light as possible.

Anyway, experiment with various options involving different combinations of large apertures and high ISO with fairly shallow depth of field while using a lot of natural light, and/or using various angles of flash by using a flash cable, and/or using more than one flash, and/or using reflectors with your flash, and/or using diffusers, and/or using very light cloth to diffuse the flash.

I chose apertures around f/11 because that was supposedly the point of maximum resolution with this particular lens. However, I tested the resolution later and found that I was happy with the results up to f/22, with f/32 still ok if needed (finding one's equipment's limitations is highly recommended, particularly before taking it out in the field).

I doubt if f/11 was the aperture with maximum resolving power, it was most likely somewhere between f/5.6 and f/8. In any case, choosing the best aperture for your picture is usually more complicated than just choosing the aperture where your lens has maximum resolving power. It is usually a compromise which also includes shutter speed concerns and desired depth of field. I often choose to shoot at f/22, despite noticeably degraded image quality due to diffraction, to get greater depth of field. I very rarely go as far as f/32 in small format; the diffraction is so great, and consequently the technical quality of the picture is so degraded, that I usually consider the results below the standards I'm looking for, for my intended uses.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Mike Spinak]

Sean,

Originally Posted by Mike Spinak
Further, most of the insect photos I have are among my less inspired shots.

Originally Posted by Sean DeMerchant
Interesting comment. One of the things I love about shooting arthropods (includes insects, arachnids, crustaceans, ...) is their incredible alien beauty.

I have no trouble appreciating their incredible alien beauty. Let me clarify what I meant by my statement, above:

Have you ever seen the book Wildlife, by Mitsuaki Iwago? On the cover of the book it shows magma flowing into the ocean, superheating the water, and shows dead fish floating on the water's surface, boiled alive, and shows ocean birds reeling in the air, feeding on the boiled fish. Right from the start, from this cover, it is clear that the pictures inside will be not merely technically well recorded pictures of interesting looking animals–they will be something more, pictures wherein their making necessitates the photographer's intimate knowledge of the subjects and involves the photographer's point of view. Another example of this kind of photography is the book The Creation, by Ernst Haas.

When possible, I like to make my pictures interpretive, as well as descriptive. In order for me to add this interpretive element to my pictures, and in order for that interpretive element to have the most worth possible, I need a level of understanding and experience and awareness with my subjects which is rarely available to me with insects. Consequently, my pictures of insects rarely show more than their splendor.

Have you spent much time with them and watching?

Some, but not as much as I need to.

...I have seen that insect photography is a natural extension of shooting flowers, and overcoming aversion to arthropods through the discovery of their beauty by people.

Hmmm... That doesn't seem to be the case with me. I shoot lots of flowers, and while insects and flowers are often found together, photographing each of them has been quite separate for me. I have no aversion to them, I just considered insect photography to be a different field, in which I didn't have any foundations.

I find interacting with bees incredibly intimate requiring the softest gentle motions and no limits on personal space. It is amazing to let a bee land on your hand and then ever so gently shake it off so you can focus on continuing to shoot. I suspect the bees feelings are rather different, but it is my feelings that affect my actions.

Like chatting with a ladybird/ladybug (truthfully a beetle and not a bug or bird) that that blade of grass was too wavy and would you please stay on a more stable platform:

Yes. I get what you are saying, and I have some level of experience with this. This sounds very similar to the approach I take with wildlife photography, more generally. This is very helpful to hear.

As a near-sighted glasses wearer I can tell you the first trick to finding insects is to not look for them....

Instead you need to look for what insects look like at a distance....

...when you look for insects... you look for plants that feel improperly shaped....

Look for motion. Most of your retina is tuned to detect motion rather than detail....

This sounds basically identical to the methods I use to find small birds in the trees, rodents hiding in the grass, and wildlife in general. Different scale and distance, but otherwise, the skills should be directly transferable.

I will respond more, when I have the time.

Thanks.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Sean DeMerchant]

Hi Mike,

Sean,
I have no trouble appreciating their incredible alien beauty. Let me clarify what I meant by my statement, above:

Have you ever seen the book Wildlife, by Mitsuaki Iwago? On the cover of the book it shows magma flowing into the ocean, superheating the water, and shows dead fish floating on the water's surface, boiled alive, and shows ocean birds reeling in the air, feeding on the boiled fish. Right from the start, from this cover, it is clear that the pictures inside will be not merely technically well recorded pictures of interesting looking animals–they will be something more, pictures wherein their making necessitates the photographer's intimate knowledge of the subjects and involves the photographer's point of view. Another example of this kind of photography is the book The Creation, by Ernst Haas.

I have seen neither. Nonetheless I just bought Wildlife of Amazon for a top notch price (shipping was twice Like-New condition price for a used copy which is less than a six pack of good beer and likely worth far more) and ordered 4 copies over other Misuaki Iwago volumes on hold from the library. I also requested the Haas volume from the library.

The Wildlife cover sounds incredible. And your discussion here gives me validation of something I have have been reticent to spend time shooting. I call it failure, but cycle of life, prey, or other titles will suffice. Some of the most amazing things I have seen in nature are failure. Watching a spider wrap its prey in spider-silk (they are insanely fast), finding the remains of an insect left lying about, a was devouring its prey, to things I have found on the beach (a gutted seal pup, a starfish stranded in the sand with thrash marks, or a dead fish stranded by the tide with marks of its struggle to survive in the sand). I have learned much by seeing. I have learned more by learning about what I say. And I have far more to learn. But I love nature in all its visual glory. Not necessarily scents though as I have had an incredibly foul odor on my hand for over two weeks for trying to haul a piece of trash off the shore. Sadly, that piece stayed (and I have hauled tons of trash off the shore over the years). I do not haul the trash as I enjoy it, I just feel worse leaving it there to begin the journey to Canada, Japan, China, ...

Anyway, as previously noted, I will elaborate on tidepool exploration with a locals perspective (I live a block from saltwater, though access is a few miles away due to bluffs) and how easy access affects visual learning. My next big step will be disposable waterproof film cameras, a wetsuit (used), fins (used), a mask (new for a large skull), and snorkel (likely new as they are inexpensive) to add the third dimension to my learning with a loss of quality (I already wade for shots).

But death intrigues me personally as much as life. Though it has less of an aesthetically pleasing feel which makes images more challenging.

When possible, I like to make my pictures interpretive, as well as descriptive. In order for me to add this interpretive element to my pictures, and in order for that interpretive element to have the most worth possible, I need a level of understanding and experience and awareness with my subjects which is rarely available to me with insects. Consequently, my pictures of insects rarely show more than their splendor.

The interpretive element of something I am still learning to grasp visually. I can visualize shots of things (a flower, an anemone, an anemone eating a persimmon, a spider wrapping a fly in silk), but the larger intuitive grasp of moving from things outwards to relationships without stepping out to landscapses/plantscapes eludes me emotionally most of the time and I am not sure how to think about it. I know the answer is simple, but it is the simple answers that are always the hardest to discern. i.e., overly complex inefficient understandings and solutions are pretty simple to come up with, it is the one that really makes sense that is hard (i.e., the plastic bread clip ;o)

I did get some bad shots of a hermit crab in a flow on a sandy shore the other day which were sharp. But, they had too much motion blur of the sand to get enough of the crab sharp to make it worthwhile at 1/160 seconds.

Some, but not as much as I need to.

Take some time when to watch when you see them. Cool cloudy days are often better than hot ones as they move slower.

...I have seen that insect photography is a natural extension of shooting flowers, and overcoming aversion to arthropods through the discovery of their beauty by people.

Hmmm... That doesn't seem to be the case with me. I shoot lots of flowers, and while insects and flowers are often found together, photographing each of them has been quite separate for me. I have no aversion to them, I just considered insect photography to be a different field, in which I didn't have any foundations.

My experience with new photographers is that flowers bridge the gap to actually seeing insects. Then the insects beauty takes over. I still do not tolerate indoor insects, but I now gently brush off most outdoor insects (call it a breeding experiment if you like, but I am simply territorial and eat meat ;o).

Yes. I get what you are saying, and I have some level of experience with this. This sounds very similar to the approach I take with wildlife photography, more generally. This is very helpful to hear.

In a media saturated society, we grow up (at least I did) with images of insects that show them at macro scale. But they do not look like that at human scale. I would suspect other creatures are similar, but sadly I have not the glass to stalk them (although I have had some good baited experiences). i.e., baiting deer is letting 1/5 acre grow as a meadow so they can find something natural to eat or a bird feeder. But I live in the country so baiting is easy and many have deer fences to protect their gardens (I last saw a live deer near my weight today). Fields of barley attract geese in season.

Some species of insects do not appear until you have looked 100+ times. This year I found a white shelled black spotted ladybird/ladybug species running around that is about 2.5 mm wide and 3.5 mm long. I have a couple adequate 1:1 shots, but need extension tubes to get them large enough for a decent 4x6 print.

So much is practice at looking and knowing when it looks wrong. Camouflage is amazing. It hides creatures, and the same underlying ideas are also a vital (if rarely acknowledged) compositional technique in photography.

This sounds basically identical to the methods I use to find small birds in the trees, rodents hiding in the grass, and wildlife in general. Different scale and distance, but otherwise, the skills should be directly transferable.

Sounds like I will have to try upscaling the technique to see bigger critters. I always catch motion (survival skill) but rarely look for abnormal shapes at larger scales (i.e., eagle on a snag).

I rarely note deer except by motion and a nighttime technique. Eyes exposed to light tend to glow. This works well with tidepools too! This is the only way I have found tiny shrimp (1.5-2 cm long) until I learned to see their camouflage. It saves lives (and whiplash) to spot deer eyes in the dark while driving.

all the best,

Sean

 

[Mike Spinak]

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

3) Get close and watch.

Yes. I do like to sit down in the thick of things and just look closely and take everything in. I like to immerse myself in the experience, and stick around a while. Unfortunately, I've been doing this less and less. This is for a variety of reasons, but largely a matter of growing physical discomfort, doing this as I get older. Lately, I have started using a foam pad to kneel on, and that has helped. I think a stool of low lawn chair would also be helpful.

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

4) Watch the same things over and over. This goes back to step 1) which relates to learning to see what your are seeing so you can easily spot when it differs. Get close and develop a feeling/intuition for what you see.

This is also something that I often do. This is how I get shots like my Passiflora Tendril and Leaftip shot, my Dusk, Tenaya Lake shot, and my Great Blue Heron Preening shot. Even though I do take shots from my first visits, and some of them are worthwhile, I generally think of my visit several visits to a subject/area/etc. as just reconnoitering, and preparatory groundwork for the pictures to come.

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

6) Many insect species gain energy from direct insolation (incident sunlight) and are more active in direct sun and warmer weather. Look for insects on still cloudy days. When insects have less energy, they move slower and are easier targets.

Yes I am aware of this and often take advantage of this. Additionally to being slowed down, many kinds of insects, like butterflies and dragonflies, pose beautifully, with their wings spread wide, when they are chilly and seeking to warm up.

I consider this a very important technique for successful insect photography, based on my experiences so far. Just this past weekend, I took advantage of clouds and shade chilling insects, in order to get successful shots of several species of butterfly.

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

7) Go to the library or online and read on up the species that interest you.

I do this, too, though rarely at the library. I usually buy books on the subjects, and also read online resources. In any case, I find that knowledge about my subjects is very helpful for the kind of photography I prefer to do; and I often study up on them.

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

8) Use flash.

Flash is a tool that I use as appropriate. It changes the set of options in lighting appearance that are available to work with... in some cases, in a way that is desired, in other cases, in a way that is not desired. I tend to minimize use of flash, because I usuallyprefer the way that natural lighting looks. I also find working with natural lighting more enjoyable than working with flash.

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

9) Some species stay out past dusk but slow down. Some bumble bee species stay out past sunset, use their slowing down to your advantage.

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll try to be more attentive to this.

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

10) Make a killing jar (rubbing alcohol soaked newspaper in the bottom of a glass jar) and capture and kill them.

I'm not willing to do this.

Originally posted by Sean Demerchant

11) Capture, refridgerate/cool, and then release the specifimen before an already set up shot with tripod at the ready.

I won't do this, either.

I'll respond some more, when I have a chance.

Thanks, again, for helpful hints and engaging conversation on the subject.

Mike

 

[KrisCarnmarker]

Interesting thread! Some very good tips already. I especially like the one about not actively looking for subjects but seeing them indirectly. I usually stand still and look straight ahead, trying to be a bit more aware of the "motion sensor" in our eyes.

I have two images to share which I feel are opposites, in a way. One is a "studio shot" (I don't actually have a studio, hence the quotes ), and the other a shot in nature.

Unknown Beetle (UAE) - 20D, 100mm Macro, 1/160, f18, ISO 100

After a number of attempts to catch this beetle in its natural surrounding, I gave up. There where two reasons for the failures: the thing is just too fast on its legs and its natural surrounding is the crack between the house wall and the ground. Not all that exciting, in other words. I then tried to place it in an arranged setting of some flowers and foliage, but again he was just too fast. This is a desert beetle and just as many other desert animals do, they avoid the heat by being fast on their feet. This may sound counter-intuitive, but ask any bicyclist

So after all else failed I took it inside and tried to do something interesting with lighting instead. The beetle is fairly uninteresting except for the golden band around its front, which is what made me want to photograph it in the first place. So I decided to make it simple. I set up the camera and flash, put a white piece of paper on a table and then experimented with flash intensity and angle to get a soft gradient. Now, I prefer not to do this, but I put the beetle in the fridge for a while so it slowed down, put it on the paper and shot away. You can see that the beetle is not fully awakened in the shot, but damn! he gets up and runns away before I get the chance



Bumble Bee (Sweden) - 20D, 100mm Macro, 1/250, f6.3, ISO 100

This shot took a long time. After chasing a number of bumble bees around for a while I decided to pick a spot, set up the tripod and pre-focused on an interesting flower with a good background. Then I waited for the bee to come to me. It was quite windy so it took quite a few shots. The flower did not always return to the same spot after the wind moved it around, and every time a different bee landed on it it would bend down differently due to the bee's weight. After about two hours the shot you see is what I got. I really need to work on getting better at handholding the camera when using the macro lens and flash.

Talking about bees and wasps and such, a funny thing happened many years ago at this same location. My father was up on a ladder painting the house one day and my brother, mother and I where down below watching him at work. Apparently he had disturbed a bumble bee's nest while painting so out of a little hole comes this huge granddaddy bumble bee and takes a look at the disturbance. After a couple of seconds it attacks my father! My father quickly climbs down the ladder and runs. The bee follows him but totaly ignores the rest of us. My father runs down one end of the yard, then back to where we are, past us and then into the house, closing the door. The bee then calmly flies back to its hole never to be seen again. During this time, it could easily have caught up with him, but did not do so, and neither did it bother with us. It just had one goal in mind, and that was to chase away my father

 

[Mike Spinak]

Originally posted by Rob.Martin

Not as good as the ones preceeding, but my lame attempts are here . .

http://www.pbase.com/lecter/butterflies or on www.1ds.com

Rob,

Feel welcome to share with us the details about the making of these pictures. This thread is about Show and Tell; with both, we can learn from each other's technique, and see illustrative examples.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Mike Spinak]

Originally posted by Michael Brown

I do prefer to shoot in natural light, maybe using reflectors and mirrors when needed.
Much of the time, I will also shoot at the other end of macro, ..... meaning that I am not after a huge amount of details, focusing mainly on the light and the composition and shooting wide open.

Michael, I really like the way you make shallow DOF work as part of your insect compositions to bring you into the insects' world. Inspirational stuff. I'll have to experiment with how I can make shallow DOF better integrate into my insect photography compositions.

Thanks.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Mike Spinak]

Originally posted by Sean DeMerchant

I have never heard of people getting past 1:1 with live and active subjects with a tripod (though I would love to see examples if anyone knows of any).

Please note that my original post in this thread is such a case. I suppse it could be argued whether the butterfly was "active", but he was certainly trembling a lot, and also fluttering in the wind.

I do agree that handheld technique certainly has its place in extreme close up insect photography. I also think that tripod mounted camera techniques can be successful in a significant minority of cases, with some perseverence.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Mike Spinak]

Originally posted by KrisCarnmarker

This shot took a long time.

In my experience, the good ones usually do. It's a tribute to you that you stuck with it and got your shot.

Originally posted by KrisCarnmarker

After chasing a number of bumble bees around for a while I decided to pick a spot, set up the tripod and pre-focused on an interesting flower with a good background... The flower did not always return to the same spot after the wind moved it around....

I think a lot of flower photographers have this mental model of flowers as having a static neutral position that they return precisely to, whenever the forces that shift them cease. The reality is that, for various reasons, there usually isn't one... at least not one precise enough for close up photographers to work with.

Originally posted by KrisCarnmarker

...every time a different bee landed on it it would bend down differently due to the bee's weight.

Also a noteworthy complication to be aware of and, if possible, be prepared for. I'm glad you brought this up; articulating the problems that impede our photographic success is usually the first step in solving those problems.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Please share your own insect photos, and stories of how you made them.

Unfortunately not my images, but I find them inspiring enough to share this link.

I have no details on the methodology, but it looks like several were taken in a studio setting (umbrella/softbox) and no wind ;-) Some seem to have been taken using a smaller two-flash setup, given the light fall-off with distance.

Bart

 

[Mark Johnston]

A few from Japan

Greetings -

Great photos and discussion.

Here are a few from the Izu Penninsula, a couple of hours south of Tokyo by train.

The jumping spiders always make me laugh; whenever I get up close they always look up as if sizing me up for breakfast:

Hawk moth:

A member of the Hairstreak family, called "beni shijimi" in Japan:

​

Best,

Mark Johnston
www.intsysint.com

 

[Ron Morse]

It is amazing how habit forming that insect photograpy is. As you start to notice the shapes, coloration paterns and so many other things about them, it just keeps drawing you in.
Yesterday I had 3 1/2 hours of shoulder surgery. As you can imagine my right arm is usless today. Today I have seen all kinds of insects where their were none 3 days ago when I was looking for them. Several blue jays were at one of the bird feeders and we watched 2 deer in the back yard for about 20 minutes.
I was going to show a couple of shots but they are changing servers at the sight were many of my images are stored so that is out for today.
Oh well time for a couple of pain killers and I will be asleep in about 15 minutes.

 

[Mike Spinak]

Ron,

I hope your shoulder heals quickly. I look forward to seeing your insect photos, in the future.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com

 

[Brian Lowe]

My Bugs

Hello all,

OK I am not a bug person but, I like seeing what bugs look like when I photograph them. I don't know much about bugs other than most the time they scare the heck out of me.

All of the photos were taken with a 100mm Macro and ringlight flash and sometimes I'll use extention tubes.


Enjoy,
Brian


This was taken in Costa Rica I dont' know what it is but, it scared the crap out of me.

This is the legs of a spider

Now, this one hissed at me and really scared the you know what out of me. I took one and that was all for me

I know this is not a bug but, a very small snake (and not on my arm thank you very much) it was in Costa Rica.

Thats all for now, I have more let me know if you want to see them?



Brian

 

[Erik DeBill]

I find that I like my insect photos with a little context. Sort of the difference between a headshot and an environmental portrait. They don't all turn out as strictly macro as a result.

Here's one that was reasonably macro. There was a giant swarm of bees feeding on a lone redbud tree in Echo Canyon at Enchanted Rock State Natural Area. I had just purchased a 50mm macro lens, so I got the sun behind me, balanced on a couple boulders and staked out a couple likely flowers. I kept at it until I got rather tired, and then found a shot I liked when I was processing them. I did, however, just watch Photoshop suck all the life out of the colors as I converted from PNG -> JPG for posting.

Next up, something that wasn't macro at all. I was hiking at Pedernales Falls State Park. I stopped at Jones Spring, about 3.5 miles back on one of the trails. This dragonfly would take off and patrol up and down the creek, then come back and sit on a couple plants. Each time it left, I moved a bit closer. I didn't have a macro lens, so I used my 70-200 at 200mm. I took pictures each time it came back, but the best were the closest - I was right at the minimum focus distance for my lens (1.2m). Hand held, so I had to balance depth of field with grain and shutter speed. I ended up with 1/500 at f5.6 and ISO 800. I actually got a couple shots of it eating an insect it caught, but they weren't quite as photogenic as this plain pose. This experience is why I'm contemplating a set of tubes to carry with me when I hike.

Finally, one from the Zilker botanical gardens. Near the butterfly garden, but instead on the edge of the dinosaur garden. I didn't want to try following a butterfly with a tripod, so it was handheld. It was a cloudy day, so I ended up at 1/250 at f5.6 and ISO 800. I used a 100mm macro. I just spent a lot of time tracking this butterfly and taking pictures as it went from flower to flower on a large bush. It didn't seem to care at all.

I don't get quite the same kick from photographing insects as I do other animals, but it's still very fun. They're really good practice for managing your focus and framing things quickly. I haven't had much luck on the occasions when I specifically went out after insects, though. They always seem to be a target of opportunity. Perhaps I need to make a project out of stalking them in my yard (that seemed to be an implied message in a couple previous posts).