Two flies, a spider and a mite

GardenersHelper

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These were captured hand-held in our garden with an EF-mount Laowa 100mm 2:1 macro on a 2X teleconverter on a Sigma MC-11 EF to E adapter on a Sony A7ii with a Yongnuo YN24EX twin flash front-mounted on the lens.

The raw files were processed with presets in DXO PhotoLab and Silkypix, and then image-specific adjustments in Lightroom to produce 1300 pixel high JPEGs which were then adjusted in Topaz DeNoise AI.

There are 1300 pixel high versions of these images in this album at Flickr.

#1 Like its fellows around our little pond, this long-legged fly was hyperactive, only coming to a halt for a few seconds at a time.

1664 09 2020_06_30 DSC05276_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-DNAIc
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#2

1664 10 2020_06_30 DSC05276_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-2-DNAIc
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#3 A much easier opportunity. Plenty of time for this one.

1664 23 2020_06_30 DSC05398_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-DNAIc
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#4 As much time as I wanted for this one. Even though the angle was a bit awkward I managed to not disturb it (that said, these particular spiders will often put up with quite a lot of photographer-induced movement).

1664 30 2020_06_30 DSC05460_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-DNAIc
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#5

1664 31 2020_06_30 DSC05431_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-DNAIc
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#6

1664 32 2020_06_30 DSC05447_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-DNAIc
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#7 By my calculations the body of this mite was around 1.2mm in diameter. It was racing around at high speed most of the time, which made it difficult to get in the frame. I think I've only ever photographed one of these before, and as far as I recall that stayed still for a long time.

1664 33 2020_06_30 DSC05470_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-DNAIc (3)
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#8

1664 34 2020_06_30 DSC05463_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-DNAIc (3)
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr
 
Last edited:
That final shot of the mite is a beauty Nick - must have been a lot of magnification there

Thanks Mike. It was 4:1, with 6mm scene height, so not all that high magnification really. (After all, it would only be 2;1 on MFT.) Here is the crop - nothing excessive (the grey area at the bottom extends to the actual size of the frame - I can't get Lightroom to show me the crop in the context of the whole frame).


1664 34a mite crop
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr
 
As always Nick, great stuff (y)
 
The Dolochopodid is a Dolichopus species (arista bare, strong dorsal bristle on hind metatarsus). There are 55 British species in this genus and this is in a group that has all yellow femora, pale lower postoculars, no fringe below hind femora and largely black antennae - you can see all of these features in the photo. This covers about 8 species of which the commonest is D. nubilus, but no way of knowing for certain from this point of view (it has a glistening white, hairy face - but the face is not visible).
 
The Dolochopodid is a Dolichopus species (arista bare, strong dorsal bristle on hind metatarsus). There are 55 British species in this genus and this is in a group that has all yellow femora, pale lower postoculars, no fringe below hind femora and largely black antennae - you can see all of these features in the photo. This covers about 8 species of which the commonest is D. nubilus, but no way of knowing for certain from this point of view (it has a glistening white, hairy face - but the face is not visible).

Thanks for the ID.
 
All good but that mite is amazing. I have seen those and they are very tricky.

Thanks David. As far as I recall I've only photographed one once before, with my FZ330, probably with a Raynox 202, and unlike the one above, that one, shown below, stayed put for a long time while I had multiple attempts.


1496 1 P1270719_PLab LR 1300h-sharpen
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

I cropped that one down to 1500 pixels high from a 3000 pixel high 12 mpix capture, so for a 1300 pixel high output that was getting towards a 100% crop, which is a big ask for a 1/2.3" sensor. As I recall the processing was difficult and I wanted to go in a bit tighter but didn't feel I could get away with it. In contrast I didn't have to crop so much for the recent one, and in any case that was from a 24 megapixel full frame sensor. The processing was much more straightforward.

Here is a comparison of the crops.


Crop - Left A7ii+2X+100, Right FZ330+prob202
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr
 
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