Dragonflies and Damselflies

[koenkooi]

Especially the first of the compound eye is fantastic.
No stacking, one shot, I suppose. Correct?
Does the EXIF show the magnification level of the MP-E65?
Thanks for the reply in advance.

Yes, a single shot at F/13 on a crop sensor. It took a lot of experimenting with clarity and sharpening to get it to look OK. Running it trough DPP4+DLO and then dragging the texture slider to the max in Lightroom seems to give a better result. The CR2 is the original LR edit, the TIF the new one. And this also shows how different Adobe colour is from Canon colour.



The magnification was 2.7x, on APS-C. I'll leave it to other sections of this forum to debate whether APS-C impacts magnification or not

$ exiftool 2017/07/IMG_2741.CR2 -MacroMagnification -Dof -focusDistancelower Macro Magnification : 2.7x Depth Of Field : 0.005 m (0.247 - 0.253 m) Focus Distance Lower : 0.25 m

 

[AlanF]

Yes, a single shot at F/13 on a crop sensor. It took a lot of experimenting with clarity and sharpening to get it to look OK. Running it trough DPP4+DLO and then dragging the texture slider to the max in Lightroom seems to give a better result. The CR2 is the original LR edit, the TIF the new one. And this also shows how different Adobe colour is from Canon colour.

View attachment 198569

The magnification was 2.7x, on APS-C. I'll leave it to other sections of this forum to debate whether APS-C impacts magnification or not

$ exiftool 2017/07/IMG_2741.CR2 -MacroMagnification -Dof -focusDistancelower Macro Magnification : 2.7x Depth Of Field : 0.005 m (0.247 - 0.253 m) Focus Distance Lower : 0.25 m

Wow!

 

[Maximilian]

This took me back to some older pics where I was working with the 100L macro and the 5D3 and very cooperative darters.
Here my best two closeups of compound eyes, one from a young female, one from a male. I'm sure, I've posted the full pics somewhere else here.
1:1 crop from the 5D3, little sharpening and exposure compensation in DPP, nothing more done.

Female, close to MFD 30 cm, 1/250, f/14, ISO2500, bright natural sun light



Male, a little bit further away. 1/200, f/16, ISO 400. fill flash with 430EX II

 

[Click]

Speaking of close-ups, I have some pictures from 4 years ago:


All from my back yard, it took a few days to stalk the dragonfly that kept visiting to get close enough with the EOS-M+MP-E65+MT24ex. The damselflies are a lot less skittish.

WOW Stunning shots. Beautiful close-ups.

 

[AlanF]

Female Emperor Dragonfly

 

[Click]

Beautiful shot, Alan.

 

[AlanF]

I was worried that the R5 would not be good for DIF because of the reports of its focussing on the background and not birds in the foregound (which hasn’t bothered me much). However, so far it has done well, so I am happy.

 

[Jack Douglas]

I was worried that the R5 would not be good for DIF because of the reports of its focussing on the background and not birds in the foregound (which hasn’t bothered me much). However, so far it has done well, so I am happy.

Alan I've had some weird fails. One was a Pileated WP that was darting his head in and out behind a stump (peak-a-boo). It refused to focus unless I used spot and then back button animal eye but as soon as the head disappeared and reappeared it was lost again and this head was filling maybe 40% of the viewfinder. It was strangely pathetic compared to my typical acquisitions where I'm generally pleased.

Jack.

 

[AlanF]

Alan I've had some weird fails. One was a Pileated WP that was darting his head in and out behind a stump (peak-a-boo). It refused to focus unless I used spot and then back button animal eye but as soon as the head disappeared and reappeared it was lost again and this head was filling maybe 40% of the viewfinder. It was strangely pathetic compared to my typical acquisitions where I'm generally pleased.

Jack.

Did it work just using spot? If so, use that and it will be as good as a DSLR. eyeAF doesn't always work, and when it fails I use centre spot.

I used centre spot for this Emperor Dragonfly ovipositing yesterday but the eyeAF tracking for it in flight.

 

[koenkooi]

I was worried that the R5 would not be good for DIF because of the reports of its focussing on the background and not birds in the foregound (which hasn’t bothered me much). However, so far it has done well, so I am happy.

Most shots it this sequence had the reeds much better in focus than the eye or beak. This shot is OK. During shooting the R5 detected the eye and the focus box never strayed from it. A quick check on the back LCD made it look the birds was in focus, only after putting it on the computer screen the backfocus became clear.

Exiftool reports:

Camera Model Name	Canon EOS R5
Lens Model	RF100-500mm F4.5-7.1 L IS USM
Focus Distance Lower	33.49 m
Focal Length	500.0 mm
Aperture	7.1
Focus Distance Lower	33.49 m

 

[AlanF]

Most shots it this sequence had the reeds much better in focus than the eye or beak. This shot is OK. During shooting the R5 detected the eye and the focus box never strayed from it. A quick check on the back LCD made it look the birds was in focus, only after putting it on the computer screen the backfocus became clear.

Exiftool reports:

Camera Model Name	Canon EOS R5
Lens Model	RF100-500mm F4.5-7.1 L IS USM
Focus Distance Lower	33.49 m
Focal Length	500.0 mm
Aperture	7.1
Focus Distance Lower	33.49 m

View attachment 198604

That's off-topic, Jack - Herons and Egrets are allowed here only if they have Dragonflies, like this Little Egret plus Red Darter. I don't know what's going wrong with your gear. I review, by the way, through the viewfinder.

 

[koenkooi]

Sometimes the dragons are helpful enough to hover, but don't want to face you:

 

[koenkooi]

A horizontal mating wheel for a change:


The forum does some really soft downsampling when using links to images, click to go to flickr for a sharper version.

 

[Click]

Very nice picture, koenkooi.

 

[Maximilian]

First time ever that I saw and caught and anax sitting. I had no choice to avoid the branch/reed in front of it.
Only by jumping in the pond. And that is not allowed and not healthy because those belong to our local wastewater treatment

 

[AlanF]

First time ever that I saw and caught and anax sitting. I had no choice to avoid the branch/reed in front of it.
Only by jumping in the pond. And that is not allowed and not healthy because those belong to our local wastewater treatment

View attachment 198613

I have very few shots of them perching and mine are nearly all in flight except for the females ovipositing.

 

[Nemorino]

EOs R and Sigma 150 2.8 macro, MT24 @ Iso 400, f/9, 1/200s
1:1 crop

 

[Click]

Great close-up. Well done, Nemorino.

 

[Maximilian]

Great close-up. Well done, Nemorino.

100% agree. great work!

 

[Maximilian]

Today I was trying on anax DIFs again. Maaaan, that was frustrating
Never came closer than 6 m. Not even once hovering. I had to pan all the time and you can imagine how small they were in the VF at that distance.
AF wasn't cooperative, too. But I managed to get those at least decent and well backlit. Those are 1:1 crops, so I would say 15 m away.
1/1600, f/8, ISO3200