Really beautiful, @GMCPhotographics
To me this looks like a slender skimmer (orthetrum sabina).
But the location where this photo was taken would be important to ID it, as @ISv already said.
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Dragonflies and Damselflies
- Thread starter AlanF
- Start date
But the location where this photo was taken would be important to ID it, as @ISv already said.
Thank you Maximilian and thank you everyone for your kind words.
I am by far...no expert in Dragon flies. As of three weeks ago my limited sum of knowlegde was thus "small, they have 4 wings and are difficult to photograph" and that one day i'd like to opportunity to get some porfolio worthy photographs of them. I had no idea that there were so many sub species, althought it's quite obvious that there would be so many.
There's a bit of a back story to this shot and few that will follow later.
I have been monitoring my father's poor health for some time, my parents emigrated to Sri Lanka about 16 years ago. He was recently diganosed with late stage MDS which developed into an aggressive Leukemia. 5 weeks ago I got the urgent call that I needed to be with him in his last stages of life and to support my mother. My father died 29th August and I've just returned home to the UK after concluding the formailities and executing my father's will.
I knew that I would have the odd spare hour where I could go out into my parent's extensive garden and nearby paddy field and photograph stuff, maybe not at the best time of day, but at this stage I'd grab what I can. I took a fair bit of kit with me, my EF 100-400 IIL which is permanantly attched to a 1.4TC in Sri Lanka and my rather larege and heavy EF 400mm f2.8 II LIS, which in Sri Lanka has a 2x TC attached most of the time.
Primarily, I was interested in shooting the local white throated Kingfishers, who are quite solitary and elusive. But after a particaulrly frustrating time, this Dragon fly came and landed right in front of me. I soon abandoned my target shy Kingfisher and turned my attention to approaching this particular subject. I had about 20 mins with it and it would often return to the same few spots, so it was relatively easy to pre-focus and pre-compose. I had no time to swap lenses and I didn't want to disturb this Dragon Fly too much...so I approached with my effective 800mm f5.6 and photographed it as close as my MFD would allow. This was hand held and has a slight crop (maybe 10%) just for framing. Hand holding a chunky 800mm lens at around 2.7m is quite hard to get the framing spot on. Thankfully the IBIS and IS units really helped me achieve good results. I was really suprised how much magnification I could get with this prime. DOF is very shallow at f5.6 but my recent experiance / learning curve with the in built focus stacking feature of the R6ii really helped get some of the wings as sharp as I could.
In terms of ID, I defer to your far superior knowledge and experiance. Thank you for the Wikipedia link, that's really informative. I'll study it more, but initialy, yes I would agree that it's most likely a Slender Skimmer. This region (Sri Lanka is close to southern India), the colours and shape certainly look similar and it's behaviour was exactly as described.
My understanding of these creatures is growing fast and it's a joy to photograph them and Identifiy them. I'm very much on my first steps with these. However, I can see that maybe next year's lens budget will go into swapping out my EF 100-400 II L for a RF 100-500L. Mostly for the AF, My EF 100-400 IIL with a 1.4x TC would never be able to lock and track a moving Dragon Fly.
I'm expecting to travel back to Sri lanka in late Febuary next year for a holiday with Mum, so maybe I can shake down a 100-500L while I'm there. Mum's house is located in Kaddigamuwa, in the Marwanella region, about an hour from Kandy.
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Foremost, my deepest condolences. I hope you and your father still had time for a few last beautiful moments and that he died gently.
Secondly, thank you so much for sharing this emotional story with us.
Reading this, I am quite sure that I got a lucky strike with my guess. Thanks for sharing that detailed data, too.
I was and am using similiar equipment as you do.
And I can tell you, if you are patient enough, you will be able to do DIF = Dragonfies In Flight.
I did this in the past with a 5D4 and the EF100-400 L II, with and without TC. So you can do that, too.
If you want or need advice, just let me know, and I will willingly and gladly share my knowledge, as will many in this thread.
Ask here or PM me.
Until then, I am happy that another one got hooked up to these fascination creatures
By the way: If you get/got some pictures of that white throated Kingfishers, please let me know.
Kingfishers are my second big passion, as you might know
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This, I think is a Crimson-tailed marsh hawk / Orthetrum pruinosum
R6ii 400mm f2.8 LIS II + 2x TC III
R6ii 400mm f2.8 LIS II + 2x TC III
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Nice again.
But I prefer the first one, because you were more on level with the skimmer.
Some advice, if appreciated (otherwise let me know): try to be parallel to the body, so you get the insect sharp head to tail.
You did that much better with your first photo.
Of course, it can also be a stylistic element to photograph the dragonfly at an angle and the abdomen fades into the OOF area.
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Aha! Yes you spotted this. Sorry, In my haste, I uploaded the wrong image. This is a single frame, and the slim DOF is a consequence of using a 800mm f5.6 with it's specific sized circle of confusion. The previous image that you prefer was the same rig, but using the in camera (R6ii) focus stack feature, combined to a sing;e frame from 9 images.
I often use this feature (shooting flowers) to maximise depth of field while keeping my background blur as creamy as I can. However, with this image stack, the in camera process created a mess around the lower abdomen. So I've just loaded the same stack into Photoshop and created a PS stack (a lot more computational power) and I've got this far better result:
I don't think the AI stacking / masking can cope with the detail in the closest wing and the detail shown via the transparency of the wing....I think this image is a good compromise.
I have two more images of this particular specimen to share, once I've psuhed them through my workflow.
Due to the antiquated PC I'm using, it was state of the art 16 years ago, with only minor upgrades along the way, I currently have to export my stack from lightroom as JPGs, close light room and then open them in Photoshop as JPGs. If I try using the RAW files directly from Lightroom I get a catastrophic crash!
Last autumn was a my camera gear upgrades / refresh, this Autumn will be my IT equipement. I have a new laptop coming at the end of the month and I'll probably refresh my desktop in October / November. Currently it's taking a Lightroom AI denoise about 20 mins per frame on my really old laptop and about 15mins on my desktop.
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Great comparison.
Beautifully backlit subject.
Lovely OOF highlight rings.
Well done, Nemorino.
My personal fav is "heide640_2", because I like the wing blur and the wing position most.
"heide1250" has the most beautiful OOF highlight rings.
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Thanks for showing us your pp work.
Great result.
But somehow it gives me the feeling that I'll stay a "one shot, no stacking" guy.
In other words: great job that you stacking people do.
But I prefer to keep the time in front of the PC screen as short as possible
Edit:
That the reason why I didn't post a photo for a few days: There is just enough time to admire your pictures
Even though I found my species #31... (keeping the tension high
)
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Last autumn, our local forester had several new ponds built in a wooded area. His aim is to stabilize the groundwater level and strengthen biodiversity....
That the reason why I didn't post a photo for a few days: There is just enough time to admire your pictures
Even though I found my species #31... (keeping the tension high
I've spoken to him several times and think his ideas for forest reorganization are really excellent. I just hope he stays with us for a few more years. But given his dynamism, I would also like to see him promoted
So the ponds are only 10 months old. And the surrounding flora still has to develop. But the fauna has already accepted them straight away.
Without searching, I found old and young frogs, grass snakes and spontaneously seven species of dragonfly, which were already busy breeding.
And one of them is: my local #31:
The emerald damselfly (lestes sponsa).
Perspective and DOF aren't perfect.
My camera settings were for DIF when I recognized that couple. And it was good, that I directly shot.
Because after these two photos, one with focus on the male, one on the female, they flew away, and I couldn't follow them without flying over the pond.
R6m2, 100-500L@500mm, f/9, 1/2000, ISO1600
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Here's a 10 shot focus stacked image. I shot it initially using the R6ii's in built focus stack feature. But the output file was a bit of a mess. However, Photoshop did a far better job, although a lot longer and requires time in front of my computer to process the files.
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Winter damselflies and common bluetails during reproduction.
R6m2, 100-500
R6m2, 100-500
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A black tailed skimmer IF.
Because of the busy BG it was quite tricky to persuade the AF to focus the focus on the insect. Even with spot AF.
R6m2, RF100-500L@500mm, f/8, 1/2000, ISO1600
Because of the busy BG it was quite tricky to persuade the AF to focus the focus
on the insect. Even with spot AF.R6m2, RF100-500L@500mm, f/8, 1/2000, ISO1600
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R5 + RF 100 2.8 L macro
all 8140px -> 3840px export
f/10
f/10
f/14, iso 25 600
You may have noticed the white thing on the wing. Seems to be a lake fly caught in a spiderweb and sticking on the wing.
crop of 950px
PS:
That day has also been a very windy.
all 8140px -> 3840px export
f/10
f/10
f/14, iso 25 600
You may have noticed the white thing on the wing. Seems to be a lake fly caught in a spiderweb and sticking on the wing.
crop of 950px
PS:
That day has also been a very windy.
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