Post your insects

[mammarazzi]

In between the showers when the sun shines, lots of these butterflies appear and feed on some thistles growing in my garden.

[Cantab]

Rita, you posted an interesting collection of photos. Do you know what this one is?

[GeorgeM]

I haven't posted anything for a while. Most of my summer has been taken up by a remodel of our downstairs living space.
I have to say that I'm very happy with my new macro lens, a Tamron 180mm f/3.5.

Wasp

wasp GAM_6327 by gmontjr, on Flickr

Katydid

katydid #2 GAM_6310 by gmontjr, on Flickr

Bee

bee GAM_6207 by gmontjr, on Flickr

Butterfly

butterfly GAM_5808 by gmontjr, on Flickr

[Letrow]

I love the detail that you get with that Tamron George.

[GeorgeM]

I love the detail that you get with that Tamron George.

It seems to perform way better than my Tamron 90.

[Geoff F]

After checking on some reviews, I see that Tamron 180 compares favourably with the Canon and Sigma 180 mm macro lenses; and at around half the price!

Anyway something from my Sigma 180. Firstly some Ivy Bees, on a very dull day just before the rain started. More shots to sort through but these sum up the scene.



The males are frantically rushing around checking for any newly emerged females.

And a mature female returning laden with pollen.



None of them were willing to stop and pose for a photo so it was a case of click where I could after rough manual focusing. And perched on a steep (near vertical) earth bank with tripod legs at different lengths around 6 ft from ground level.

I'm definitely getting too old for this sort of thing!

And on the way back, this cranefly looked interesting; but I'm struggling to find an identification.

[GeorgeM]

I wonder how many crane flies I've seen that I thought were large mosquitoes?
Nice bees!

[deetheturk]

Hi George,

Great images,if you dont mind me asking,what flash set up do you use?

cheers David

[GeorgeM]

Hi George,

Great images,if you dont mind me asking,what flash set up do you use?

cheers David

Thank you for your comment, David. It is much appreciated.
I did not use flash, just available light, which I very much prefer.

This one was shot with on-camera flash. I don't like the hot spots on the wasp


wasp GAM_6749 by gmontjr, on Flickr

[Geoff F]

Always difficult to know whether to use flash. Often, particularly in bright sun, I actually find the hot spots to be worse without flash; and there can also be problems with harsh shadows.

I tend to use a little flash as my default setting then turn it off if I get problems.

Where possible, I edit to clone over bad spots, but this can look unnatural and worse than the spots if you aren't careful.

Reflectors or diffusers can be used for flowers etc in a similar way to portrait photography; but often not practical for live insects.

ps. There are a great many species of craneflies, George, and too many of them seem virtually identical until you start closely examining the wing veins or genitalia!

[Letrow]

Pieris rapae

[GeorgeM]

I'm guessing that this is some kind of assassin bug. Kinda windy yesterday.


assassin bug GAM_7641 by gmontjr, on Flickr

Back view:


assassin bug GAM_7631 by gmontjr, on Flickr

[Cantab]

George, thankfully there are no assasin bugs up here (I hope). They look awful. What size are they?

[GeorgeM]

That one is really tiny, maybe half an inch long. I believe those are Euphorbia blossoms, for a size reference.
Years ago, I saw a much larger one, a Wheel Bug.


Insects and Spiders by gmontjr, on Flickr

[deetheturk]

Better late than never,thanks George for sharing your technique on flash-non flash with me,much appreciated

cheers David

[GeorgeM]

Better late than never,thanks George for sharing your technique on flash-non flash with me,much appreciated

cheers David

You're quite welcome, David, but I have to say that Peter and Geoff would be much better sources of knowledge. I have much more to learn. I use manual mode and chose too high a shutter speed versus aperture. The DOF on the little assassin bug is poor. Of course, it was nowhere to be found the next day.

[Geoff F]

Deciding on a suitable aperture for sufficient focus depth is another compromise situation. A narrower aperture gives better depth of sharp focus but also causes some reduction in image quality.

With average lenses, F11 should produce good results but with some potential loss of focus depth.

I find F14 to be a good trade off position; and F16 is usually acceptable for good quality lenses. But some quality loss can be expected beyond F16.

The alternative, which I sometimes use, is to take two or more shots at different focus depths then combine them as stacked layers with suitable software.

But not practical with moving subjects, or wind rock on leaves etc.

Where there is just a little movement between shots, for example an antennae twitch, I have successfully auto aligned the layers then manually edited a mask to just use what worked best on each layer.

[GeorgeM]

Moar bugz!

Nomming the aphids...

wasp GAM_7677 by gmontjr, on Flickr

Too bad on the focus of the head...

wasp GAM_7516 by gmontjr, on Flickr

I guess this is just a regular old fly.

fly GAM_7394 by gmontjr, on Flickr

Waiting...

spider DSC_6016 by gmontjr, on Flickr

Katydid what?!

katydid #2 GAM_6310 by gmontjr, on Flickr

[johnbharle]

You know, not really a bug, but he's cute.

[Letrow]

bumblebee