Francois Meehan's blog » insects

Anybody home?

fmeehan — Sat, 28 May 2011 16:51:54 +0000

Camera and processing: iPhone

François Meehan

Dragonfly, Ecomuseum (pic)

fmeehan — Sat, 08 May 2010 01:17:35 +0000

Spotted by a pond at the Ecomuseum (Montreal West-Island). I did this image with a LensBaby Composer and it’s macro kit.

Nikon D90
Exposure : 1/250
Aperture : f/5.6
ISO: 200
Lens : LensBaby composer avec Kit Macro
Aperture, Topaz Denoise 3 andt Adjust 4, Nik ColorEfex pro

François Meehan

The year of the wasps

fmeehan — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 02:20:15 +0000

If there were one thing that was a pain in the “bip bip” this year, it was the unusual amount of wasps in the Montreal region.

I recall one meeting in the old Montreal, on the terrasse (on the roof) of the Nelson Hotel, while sipping a 10$ mojito, I was attack by the little beasts. The poor people who ordered a pink martini, was a whole lot worse for them…

A few weeks ago, as the leaves started to fall, I found this nasty nest.

Now I do understand why they were so many: have you seen the size of this thing? Unreal…

Nikon D90
Exposure : 1/750
Aperture : f/9.5
ISO: 800
Focal length : 300 mm (450 en DX)
Aperture, Topaz Denoise and Detail, Nik Color Efex pro

I just hope they will be more “discrete” in 2010…

François Meehan

Who is observing who? A curious grasshopper…

fmeehan — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 00:17:03 +0000

Sometimes when you are doing shots of animals or insects, you might wonder “who is oberving who?”.

For example, take this magnificent grasshopper, her ” friends” were avoiding me as if I was a monster (from their perspective, I probably was . None of them would let me approach within 5 feet with my equipment. This one had a totally different behavior.

Nikon D90
Exposure : 1/60
Aperture : f/22
ISO: 400
Focale length : 105 mm (157 en DX)
Integrated Flash with Gary Fong’s Puffer and a Nikon SB-900 flash with Warm gel et diffuser in remote mode.
Aperture, Nik’s Viveza, Topaz Denoise 3 and Adjust.

I was able to approach it within 1.5 foot, took shots for a good 10 minutes with 2 strobes. It slowly moved on its plant, allowing me to try different angles.

At a certain point, I was wondering if it was not “analyzing” me, it felt weird…

Nikon D90
Exposure : 1/60
Aperture : f/22
ISO: 400
Focale length : 105 mm (157 en DX)
Aperture, Nik’s Viveza, Topaz Denoise 3 and Adjust.

For the occasion, I used the built-in flash with a diffuser (Gary Fong’s puffer) and a remote SB-900 flash in remote mode equipped with a warm gel, also with a diffuser, hand held, no tripod.

François Meehan

Three Bugs from “Jardins de métis”.

fmeehan — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 15:19:01 +0000

Even tough we were going at the jardins de Métis for the flowers (other articles to come on the subject), I saw some good opportunities to shoot insects.

For the occasion, I used my Sigma 105 mm macro and the Nikon SB-900 with a warm gel, in wireless mode. Did also use the D90 integrated flash, along with Gary Fong’s Puffer .

Had to config flashes with a -7 compensation (ITTL mode), the sun was really strong. Light not easy to work with, did learn a lot that morning.

Please take note that I am not an expert when comes to talk about insects (and flowers for that matter). I had to research and asked for help to identify my victims. It is quite possible that I am wrong, in such case don’t hesitate to let me know.

Let’s start with a red dragonfly, most probably a crimson-ringed whitheface.

Don’t forget to click on the images to see them bigger…

And then an azure damselfly.

And to finish, a lovely spider, sorry, could not find its kind.

Pictures of the flowers of “jardin des Métis” to follow soon.

For the 3 pictures:

Nikon D90
Exposure : 1/200
Aperture : f/11
Flash SB-900 in wireless mode
ISO: 640
Focal length : 105mm (157 en DX)
Aperture, Topaz Denoise 3, Define from Nik software

François