A few wasps

[DanK]

Two days I found myself next to some huge wild mint plants and goldenrod, both of which were swarming with wasps. I lost count, but there must have been 10 or more species. Oddly, other than a single bumblebee, I saw no bees at all--neither other native bees nor honeybees.

However, I didn't have two parts of my normal bug-chasing gear: a diffused flash, and a monopod. So, I had to do this handheld. I set the camera to 1/125 (probably too slow, but I didn't want to increase ISO too much) and f/13, with auto-ISO. This resulted in some captures being at ISO 12,800, including the one here in goldenrod. I shot using a 100mm lens with a 10mm extension tube and a 1.4x converter. (The extension is needed in order to fit a Canon extender onto a Canon 100mm macro lens.)

At that magnification, hand motion is a problem, and even with the hybrid IS that my macro lens has, I think these suffered from hand motion even at 1/125. And the quality of the image of course deteriorated with ISO.

I did just some basic editing in LR--some noise reduction (which I normally don't do), sharpening, a bit of clarity, texture, and vibrance. I am not sure the captures are high enough quality to warrant more. Still, they show the critters clearly.

C&C welcome, of course.

[Wavelength]

Excellent images!!!