38 seconds!

[James G]

I've been photographing butterflies for years, as and when the opportunity arose. I've managed captures of The Orange Tip (Anthocharis cardamines), on a number of occasions, but in every case, I had a few seconds at best before it was off on its travels.
Today, I had 38 secs, and 21 captures. RESULT!
#1



#2



#3



#4



#5



Captured on Canon 7D mk2, with Canon 100mm macro.

C&C Welcome

[Ziggy]

Beautiful BFly and well captured.

[Stagecoach]

An extremely productive use of that 38 seconds available James

It's No 5 for me, great capture.

[marlunn]

#5 for me as well - nice, very nice

[JohnRostron]

Very nice. Definitely #5. I have not seen an Orange Tip yet this year. They are one of the species to record for the first appearance of Spring.

John

[John 2]

Great captures James. First one for me but only because the BG is clear of the twig.

[Loose Canon]

A beautiful creature James. Good of it to cooperate with an extended shoot!

They are all excellent shots.

I’m liking #5.

The reason is for the tad bit more contrast it seems to have over the others. To my eye that brings the detail more (hair-like stuff on the body/wings), the speckling on the wings, and of course, the colors.

I was undecided about the BG. Specifically the “Y” shaped twig or whatever it is. The #1 shot doesn’t have it so prominently. So in comparison I naturally gravitated to it not being so evident. Had I not seen #1 I never would have thought about it probably. Cool that you changed aspect as the subject moved around the “perch”!

In retrospect, it ain’t no thang and may even help point to the subject the way is angled!

One thing I can’t get away from is a couple of specs/spot in the shot (#5). One right by the subject’s wings. I’m sorry but I’m hyper-sensitive to these things from my own preferred subject matter.

I also apologize for my very un-scientific knowledge of the species! I mean really? Hair-like stuff??? Total total philistine I know but they are all from the family Whatthehellibus Isthisicus to me!

Again they are all excellent and I have enjoyed travelling around your frames!

[Shadowman]

Nice series.

[eepee]

Beautiful series of pictures and spot on with the focus!

[IzzieK]

One word James: WOW!!!

[Marie Hass]

Really nice! Preference is #1 bc of the background, but liking the butterfly in #5 bc you can see his eye better.

All in all, what a beautiful species!

Marie

[James G]

Thankyou all for your vey kind comments! As John commented, this is one of the 'iconic' spring butterflies over here, and it is the first one I've seen this year.

I did not noticed the sapling in the background, or more precisely it was sufficiently blurred in the viewfinder that it did not seem to interfere too much.

The area of the capture was on the rather steeply sloping bank of a pond... one more step forward and I would have been swimming so there was not much room to move about, they are also a species which seems to get spooked very easily by any movement. That said, the pond gave a relatively neutral shaded background .

Terry, I took another look at #5 to check out blown areas. They are not particularly obvious on my system, but I am seeing full size originals that have not been through Tinypic.
I checked back on the adjusted raw capture though, and I did allow a bit of blowout on the white side of the histogram.

I've now adjusted. Interestingly the raw processed image looked a bit dark, so I've done a little additional post-processed CS6 to brighten the finished image.

I'd be interested to hear what you think...

#6 Reprocessed Image



#5 Original process



ps just viewed the posted revision and apart from a difference in the brightness of the background I'm not seeing a noticeable change in the butterfly. (There is a bit more tonal detail in the upper quadrant of the wings when viewed in the lightbox) ..............James

[Loose Canon]

Well James I think the edit looks great.

I’m sorry but I didn’t think I mentioned anything about any blown highlights. Or at least I didn’t mean to! I didn’t really notice anything along that line that stood out.

[Texas Dave]

I like #5 as well! As far as your camera work, eye and post work goes, AWESOME!

It's a marvelous creature you've captured there and I would consider that frame as a trophy of accomplishment. Well done!

[James G]

Hi Terry, my bad I think, I was scanning responses last night and 'assumed' blown areas on the wings... They tend to blow very quickly. All good though because it did prompt me to take a closer look...

David, I'll be printing it this evening, and I suspect it will be end up a candidate for my top ten wildlife captures.

[Geoff F]

As you mentioned earlier, James, they do flit around all the time and rarely settle for long enough to focus. This year seems to be particularly good for Orange Tips and they have been flying all around me; one even briefly perched on my camera as soon as I looked away! But so difficult to actually photograph.

I did manage my first shot today but it didn't show the orange flash and was only on a bramble leaf which developed over bright areas in the direct sunshine.

These males spend all their time looking for females and will come to any white object, such as white flowers thinking that it might be a female. Females are all white above which makes them difficult to separate from the other white butterflies that are flitting around; although they do have the same speckled undersides as males.

[Barbara Ponder]

Lovely photos!