As I continue my experimenting with Macro Photography, there a bunch of subjects I want to photography. Bugs are on the list.
I generally do not like bugs. I find them creepy and crawly. But there are exceptions to this including the lovely little lady, the Ladybug. I have always been drawn to these cute red bugs. I love seeing them in the Spring when they wake and love seeing them through the summer.
Recently, there has been a bad aphid outbreak locally and the other day while walking into our house I noticed a bunch of plants covered in them. As I looked closer, I saw many more.
Let the hunt begin!
I grabbed my camera, equipped it with the proper lens and macro extension, checked my settings and settled in to see what I could capture.
At one point in my photojournalism training, one professor would just the phrase – “Crawl on your belly like a reptile”. He would tell us that to remind us that we have to look at life from a different vantage point. This was one of those such times.
Settling into the grass, I gradually creeped towards my subjects, trying not to drive them off. First target in sight… get close… focus… damn, too slow. Find another subject… creep towards it … focus… damn, too slow again. Locate another subject, repeat.
This time, a little more luck.
Shooting Macro, you have to make sure your focus is correct. You also need to make sure you have enough depth of field. As I experiment with this, I keep repeating my process until full success. Depth of field is substantially less when doing macro, so you need to ensure you have enough.
This time, the lady bug sat still long enough for me to capture this image. It is shot late afternoon with natural sunlight. There is little cropping done to the image so you can see how the macro lens allows you to get up close.
I was able to get about 4 images done when she moved on to search for more aphids to eat.
Looking for my next subject, I took that journalism profs advise and got even lower. I was able to find another little one, making her way through the grass.
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As she crawled up and down through the tall grasses, I was able to keep an eye on her for a couple of minutes. Framed in the tall grass, a little bit of backlighting and some soft light on her made the red of her shell stand out against the green surroundings.
I have to admit this image looks a lot better after having a little bit of correction done in Photoshop and Aurora HDR (a HDR and filter program I have been using lately to make my images pop a little more). Adding a little contrast, a little bit of burning and dodging and adding a little vignette helps draw you into this magical mystical world.
I kept the hunt up for a little while longer looking for one more cooperative subject. I finally found her, sitting sunning herself on the leaf of a sucker from our cherry tree. Photographed in the natural light of the late summer, she sat still and allowed me to get up close to her (with the lens 2-3 cm from the front of the lens).
I am going to keep looking for more things we do not usually see as I continue to experiment with Macro.