Honey hunters and a swallow

[Slapo]

Some photos from today I thought I might share.
Nikon D50 and Sigma 70-300 mm APO DG macro used for all of these.

Unfortunately, there's lots of blown out whites in the 'honey hunter' photos, but there should always a spot that's black, so the dynamic range was a bit high - also thanks to the flash.
I went out to get some swallows (so I didn't take my tripod with me), but had little luck with the swallows and more luck with the bees(?).

Thanks for viewing.

EDIT: edited the swallow a little bit. Some noise came out too, but I couldn't avoid that.

 

[Jimmy_Lemon]

The detail on some of those is just stunning nice work! maybe a tad more depth of field to help keep the whole insect in focus, but still good stuff

 

[StuartH]

Very well done mate..swallow looks a tad under exposed though on my screen.

 

[Slapo]

Cheers guys

 

[oldgit]

Good bees. Swallow could do with a tad more PP

 

[madmitch]

Great Bees but i think your Swallow could be a House Martin.

 

[Slapo]

Cheers

 

[Deleted member 3428]

Nice bees but sorry to tell you they're drone flies (Eristalis tenax) not bees

 

[Slapo]

They still hunt for nectar, it seems.

Thanks for the information, I was wondering if they were bees or something else.

 

[lammie]

Agree with Mitch about house martin, but still a very good attempt at capturing it. Birds in flight aren't the easiest to take, I find it very hard to do especially the smaller fast flying ones. Like the shots o the honey hunters.

 

[Slapo]

Thanks lammie