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@LCPete posted a question recently around using extension tubes with natural light. Although I think he's hoping to get a bit closer it made me think about some damselfly shots I took earlier this year with my zoom lens and an extension tube.
I only processed one at the time, as it was the only one I was halfway happy with. Anyway I went back to review my archive and found a couple of others that I thought might be OK. The detail on them is terrible. This is partly due to the natural light, subject movement (it was quite breezy that day), my lack of skills but I am mainly blaming my crappy lens. Even without the extension tube I've never really been happy with the image quality it gives me, but it is the longest lens I own. Anyway, here they are, I think they are all the same species as I understand there can be significant colour variation, particularly with the females but also teneral males:
Blue-tailed Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Blue-tailed Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Blue-tailed Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Sadly this was about as close as I could get at the time. It was quite sunny (I was in the south of Spain) and although I did get up early to go looking for them, I didn't spot any until they started flying around. I did manage to get closer to one (sadly not close enough for a portrait) and managed to get a 5 image panorama along the body length which I finally got round to merging:
Panoramic Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
The full resolution file is pretty big, but there are some nice details and you can see all the problems with it here (Warning! It might take some time to load).
Just for completeness, this was the one I processed at the time that I was more happy with although I have posted it in this forum before:
Blue-tailed Damselfly (Infuscans form) by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Really hoping to get more opportunities to shoot these this year! There's plenty of room for improvement!
I only processed one at the time, as it was the only one I was halfway happy with. Anyway I went back to review my archive and found a couple of others that I thought might be OK. The detail on them is terrible. This is partly due to the natural light, subject movement (it was quite breezy that day), my lack of skills but I am mainly blaming my crappy lens. Even without the extension tube I've never really been happy with the image quality it gives me, but it is the longest lens I own. Anyway, here they are, I think they are all the same species as I understand there can be significant colour variation, particularly with the females but also teneral males:
Blue-tailed Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Blue-tailed Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Blue-tailed Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Sadly this was about as close as I could get at the time. It was quite sunny (I was in the south of Spain) and although I did get up early to go looking for them, I didn't spot any until they started flying around. I did manage to get closer to one (sadly not close enough for a portrait) and managed to get a 5 image panorama along the body length which I finally got round to merging:
Panoramic Damselfly by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
The full resolution file is pretty big, but there are some nice details and you can see all the problems with it here (Warning! It might take some time to load).
Just for completeness, this was the one I processed at the time that I was more happy with although I have posted it in this forum before:
Blue-tailed Damselfly (Infuscans form) by Tim.Garlick, on Flickr
Really hoping to get more opportunities to shoot these this year! There's plenty of room for improvement!
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