Insects in flight - attempt no.2 - serious critique wanted

SarahLee

SarahLee

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Sarah
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Sorry if I'm starting to bore you all silly with this :confused::

I've set myself the challenge of capturing a "good" shot of a bee in flight before the end of the Summer.
Anyway, since I only get round to getting the camera out at weekends, this is week 2 and my second attempt.

Conditions were rubbish today. Really overcast and very windy so I just couldn't get the shutter speed I needed for the bees (even at ISO 800) . . . instead, here's this week's offering of a hoverfly <cough> hovering.

Getting a lot closer to what I want to achieve, and I learnt a lot about technique this week.
But I think I've suffered from too slow a shutter speed even with the easier to shoot Hoverfly. I seem to have a vague hazy area where its wings are, rather than some nicely motion blurred flight action :bonk:

On a positive note, I feel it's a step in the right direction though.

I need some serious critique and suggestions if I'm going to get this type of shot right. But if you don't have any pearls of wisdom, a bit of encouragement that I'm moving the right way would be appreciated too.

​

And for comparison, here's last weeks slightly embarrassing effort . . .

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Good capture, and I like the composition, Have you tried using flash? I've found photographing insects in flight a lot easier since I started using it; http://www.talkphotography.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=245249
The hummingbird moth was shot with a cheap manual flash , at 1/400th sec iso125 and was my first succesfull capture of one of these, in flight you can hardly see the wings.
 
timbo46 said:
Good capture, and I like the composition, Have you tried using flash? I've found photographing insects in flight a lot easier since I started using it; http://www.talkphotography.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=245249
The hummingbird moth was shot with a cheap manual flash , at 1/400th sec iso125 and was my first succesfull capture of one of these, in flight you can hardly see the wings.
Click to expand...

Thanks Tim.
At the moment I'm limited to the onboard pop-up flash, which I don't think is the right tool for this sort of thing . . . I am tempted to invest in a flash as my next bit of photographic kit though.
The problem is that I'm still new to photography and I could keep splashing out on new bits of kit all over the place and not use most of it. Trying to feel out where the limitations of what I already have are before I buy anything new.

Something to bear in mind though - your Hummingbird moth shots in motion are stunning. Something for me to keep aiming for.

nigpd said:
The first one is a belter Sarah. Made all the good for being in focus along the length. Keep up the good work
Click to expand...

Thanks Nigel.
Definitely an improvement on last week's attempt. Now if next week I can improve again by the same amount, I might get something that I'm almost happy with :)
 
I think you've done a good job Sarah. (y)

I've had my first try at this today with mixed results. I used a Canon 430 EXII on camera to try and freeze the moment. It also seems to bring out the colours in the lavender on what was a pretty drab day.

4827340074_46ec792d75_o.jpg
 
If it's serious critique you want then you have some way to go. That's not to say it's bad but you have already pointed out the issues. In No1 the subject also looks oversharpened in software - or it's a very large crop!

What lens are you using?
 
wippers said:
I think you've done a good job Sarah. (y)

I've had my first try at this today with mixed results. I used a Canon 430 EXII on camera to try and freeze the moment. It also seems to bring out the colours in the lavender on what was a pretty drab day.
Click to expand...

That's pretty impressive (especially for a first attempt) - starting to think more and more that flash might be the answer to this.

rayman64 said:
hi sarah i think flash is the answer take a look at stephen daltonhttp://www.stephendalton.co.uk/ his high speed flash is fantastic
Click to expand...

OK - you've thoroughly depressed me now. After looking at those I feel like giving up right now :p
(Joking. I'm far more stubborn than that, but I don't think I'll ever get to anything of that quality. Some amazing photos there though)

EOS_JD said:
If it's serious critique you want then you have some way to go. That's not to say it's bad but you have already pointed out the issues. In No1 the subject also looks oversharpened in software - or it's a very large crop!

What lens are you using?
Click to expand...

Thank you !!!!
And I'm not kidding myself that I haven't got a long way to go. This was my second attempt at this, so I'm hoping that I see another marked improvement from week 2 to week 3.

This wasn't a huge crop, but I could well have messed up the resizing and sharpening for web . . . although I suspect that the problem was more likely in my attempt to lighten the image. The original was underexposed, also a fair bit of noise there due to using ISO800.

Uncropped version attached for comparison.

At the moment, I'm only using the Canon 18-55mm kit lens . . . yes I know it's far from ideal :confused::. But I really want to find the limits of this lens and gauge how much of this sort of stuff I'm likely to do before going and splashing out on new glass.
TBH the biggest limiting factor right now is my own ability rather than the equipment and if I upgraded kit every time I hit a rough patch I'd have a bag rammed full of various bits & pieces by now.

​
 
Stick at it Sarah. I reckon you've done pretty well considering your first time and with only a kit lens. Although the images from Stephen Dalton are amazing, I would say that pretty much all of them are staged shots using non-wild subjects and not quick snaps of what's going on in the garden, so don't compare your images to those.
I would definitely recommend using a flash though. You could even try your built in flash for now and see if that helps. (y)
 
Sarah
I tink the biggest challenge is using the lens. f5.6 doesn't let in enough light. The 60mm Macro would be a great lens for you (100mm if you can afford it). Allows you to get real close and capture those images you want.

Or you could go the lelephoto route with something like a 300mm lens.

THe 18-55 is too resricted.

I use the 100mm macro although not very often these days.
 
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