Nicest things to do is finding a butterfly

  • Thread starter Thread starter Andre
  • Start date Start date
AI Thread Summary
The discussion centers around the experience of visiting butterfly greenhouses, where participants share their admiration for the vibrant colors and beauty of butterflies. Users describe the atmosphere of these conservatories, highlighting their humid environments filled with diverse butterfly species. Photography tips are exchanged, with suggestions for improving butterfly shots, such as adjusting shutter speed and aperture for better focus and clarity. Participants also share their own butterfly photographs, discussing techniques and equipment used, including macro lenses. The conversation touches on nostalgia for childhood collections of butterflies and insects, while also emphasizing the enjoyment of capturing these creatures through photography. Overall, the thread showcases a community of butterfly enthusiasts sharing experiences, tips, and beautiful images.
  • #51


I could see some of these as wall hangings Andre. Such crisp bright colors. Lovely.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
  • #52


I <3 this thread!
 
  • #53


HeLiXe said:
I <3 this thread!

I have never understood this icon.

I always think it looks like an a**-hat.
 
  • #54


:smile: Well at least it looks like something to you...when I first saw it, all I thought was "less than three":-p Maybe it would be a better emoticon for *$%hat than a heart...
 
  • #55


Butterflies <3 coneflowers, as do bees and hummingbirds. The bush is right in back of my monitor so I can peek out from time to time to see who's here.

coneflowers.jpg
 
  • #57


Nice Andy, but would that visitor be so kind and sit still for one and a half second?

I had rejected this picture as first choice at first, because it was underexposed. It's likely that the control mechanism cut off the flash early due to the overwhelming light return from the flash due to those flowers close by.

But the butterfly (~Christina~, did you identify it already?) was hovering as can be seen from the folded legs and yet it was quite crisp, so I decided to unreject it and do some RAW post processing, to get rid of the noise due to the underexposure.

This is the full shot

11hz48x.jpg


and a 50% crop (showing the noise too)

24fd9tw.jpg
 
  • #58


Beautiful.
 
  • #59


Beautiful butterflies and bees, indeed!
 
  • #60


Andre said:
Nice Andy, but would that visitor be so kind and sit still for one and a half second?

I had rejected this picture as first choice at first, because it was underexposed. It's likely that the control mechanism cut off the flash early due to the overwhelming light return from the flash due to those flowers close by.

But the butterfly (~Christina~, did you identify it already?) was hovering as can be seen from the folded legs and yet it was quite crisp, so I decided to unreject it and do some RAW post processing, to get rid of the noise due to the underexposure.

Nice photo- excellent sharpness as well; what lens are you using?

Yes, the bee not only sat still for 1.5 seconds (not to mention the lack of a breeze), but didn't mind me sticking the camera in its face... I should probably get a flash...
 
  • #61


Andy Resnick said:
Nice photo- excellent sharpness as well; what lens are you using?

All the butterfly pix of these last two weeks that I posted here were make with a Canon EOS 550D and a EF 100mm Macro f2.8 USM

Obviously hand held, and mandatory small aperture (f11-16) and short shutter speed (1/200s) you could either choose for ISO 12,800 and get pea soup noise texture or add a flash and shoot crisp with 100 ISO.
 
  • #62


Excellent... "Canon's most fun per dollar lens" :)
 
  • #63


yes, absolutely, it is.
 
  • #64


Here's some competition for Andy in the notabutterfly category. I told you that coneflowers attract butterflies, bees, and hummingbirds... :-p

(Fibonacci sequence, anybody?)

beecone.jpg
 
Last edited:
  • #65


To illustrate that, here is a life size crop of that Morpho menelaus that I posted earlier in this thread:

15pjv2b.jpg



from:

Andre said:
Found another butterfly greenhouse. A few of today's captures:

...

vrudyp.jpg


...
 
  • #66


turbo-1 said:
Here's some competition for Andy in the notabutterfly category. I told you that coneflowers attract butterflies, bees, and hummingbirds... :-p

(Fibonacci sequence, anybody?)

Andre said:
To illustrate that, here is a life size crop of that that I posted earlier in this thread:


from:

I'm seeing the advantages of a flash.
 
  • #67


No flash in my case, Andy. Just a little Panasonic point-and-shoot in Macro AF mode. I love that little pocket camera.
 
  • #68


turbo-1 said:
Here's some competition for Andy in the notabutterfly category. I told you that coneflowers attract butterflies, bees, and hummingbirds... :-p

(Fibonacci sequence, anybody?)

@_@ Oooooooooooooh pretty!
 
  • #69


HeLiXe said:
@_@ Oooooooooooooh pretty!
Thanks! Snapshot with a little DMC-ZS3 in macro mode. I'd love to have a Canon 100mm macro (fun!), but for now, I'm getting by with what I've got.
 
  • #70


turbo-1 said:
Thanks! Snapshot with a little DMC-ZS3 in macro mode. I'd love to have a Canon 100mm macro (fun!), but for now, I'm getting by with what I've got.

I'm really impressed! Just shows I need to work on my technique... :)
 
  • #71


This is about the closest you'd get, category: almost-a-butterfly or pond damselflies.

This is a minimum range shot 1:1 macro of a yet to determine species. It's total length estimated just short of 2 in. Image reduced to 16%

2vn48yd.jpg


The lack of DOF and the movement of the reed (and camera :rolleyes: ) precludes manual focussing, lock the focus and readjust the composition. So I used the focus setting "AI Servo", focussing continuously. As a consequence the head is centered in the picture and not a lot of body is visible.

A 100% crop, showing the narrow DOF.

dg03tk.jpg
 
  • #73


Andy Resnick said:
I'm starting to get better: here's a 100% crop using a 24mm macro, stopped down to f/11 or so:
Very nice!
 
  • #74


Why does it look like pictures taken at my lavender bush?
 
  • #75


Borek said:
Why does it look like pictures taken at my lavender bush?

Howdy, neighbor!:)
 
  • #77


Andy Resnick said:
I want to be able to take pictures like this:

Don't feel alone
 
  • #78
Andre said:
But the butterfly (~Christina~, did you identify it already?) was hovering as can be seen from the folded legs and yet it was quite crisp, so I decided to unreject it and do some RAW post processing, to get rid of the noise due to the underexposure.

I still stand by my original guess of the butterfly being a Queen Alexandra's Birdwing.
I found this picture of a closed winged butterfly which looks similar to what you have in your picture.
http://www.arkive.org/queen-alexandras-birdwing/ornithoptera-alexandrae/

Edit: It seems that there are a variety of "Birdwing" butterfly species which generally all have the red body and yellow abdomen.
 
Last edited:
  • #79


So I went to the butterfly greenhouse in the botanical garden of the University of Utrecht today, right, the one with the paleomagnetic laboratory, https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?p=2304947#post2304947 , the last weekend it is open.

I saw this:

9k9egh.jpg
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #80


Woah :!) Beautiful Andre. Do you have a larger size? I'd like to set it as my desktop screen :)
 
  • #81


Very beautiful Andre.
 
  • #82


Wow, very beautiful picture, Andre! I love those cute little butterflies!
 
  • #83


Thanks, all and for drizzle the full format picture, uncropped http://dl.dropbox.com/u/22026080/IMG_2379hdn.JPG
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #84


Wonderful! Cheers Andre :)
 
  • #86


Another butterfly greenhouse today. The wettest hottest so far. I had to change shirts, great that it's cool outside today.

The star of the show

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/22026080/but1.jpg

More in close up

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/22026080/but2.jpg

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/22026080/but3.jpg

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/22026080/but4.jpg

now, these little yellow dots? Pollen? parasite? parasite eggs?:

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/22026080/but5.jpg

Not the star of the show, but the shot is esthetically the most pleasing IMO:

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/22026080/but6.jpg
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #87


Great pictures, I love the DoF you get on the macros. I would maybe play with cropping a bit. E.g. trying a square image format
 
  • #88


M Quack said:
Great pictures, I love the DoF you get on the macros. I would maybe play with cropping a bit. E.g. trying a square image format

Yes you're right, these are mere thumbnails of the whole frames for quick result. There is a lot of finetuning with post processing and cropping ahead.
 
  • #89


Nice! I'm beginning to think butterflies are more vain than cats. They seem to love to pose!
 
  • #90


Absolutely beautiful Andre!
 
  • #91


I should start budgeting for a decent macro. My wife is turning our front lawn into a jungle of flowering plants, so we get lots of butterflies.
 
  • #92


Thanks Evo and Lisa, yes trying to estimate their vanity will be in vain.

I hope it will work out Turbo, the 100mm is really at bargains prices nowadays, at least here in the Netherlands.

For Borek, Marzena and other Canon 7D users with a Canon brand macro lens, make sure to select AI Servo for this type of work, for an amazing keeper rate. All my shots were in focus. I wished I had known that earlier.

VtKj-O3fWEU[/youtube]
 
  • #93


Andre said:
make sure to select AI Servo for this type of work

Yep, important part of shooting macro. Not necessarily with 7D, it was already present since at least 400D (but most likely much earlier).
 
  • #94


Beautiful Andre :)
 
  • #95


Borek said:
No tropical butterflies here, so we have to deal with whatever we can find in the field and around the house:

Latin names - in file names. Pictures marked with asterisk taken by Marzena. That's not all, but others are not necesarilly worth of showing.

Andre, those are beautiful pictures. Thanks for posting.

Borek, what a variety of different butterflies you've captured! Thanks. The one with the silver arc under his underwing is a Comma, if I am not mistaken.

NQ :-)
 
  • #96


NileQueen said:
Borek, what a variety of different butterflies you've captured! Thanks. The one with the silver arc under his underwing is a Comma, if I am not mistaken.

Thanks.

As explained in the post - file names are Latin names of the butterflies. You are right:

Polygonia_c-album_.jpg


is a comma, AKA Polygonia c-album (known here as rusałka ceik - as far as I know c in ceik is related to the c shape on the wing, otherwise no word like ceik in Polish).
 
  • #97


Thanks NQ, Gad

Borek said:
Yep, important part of shooting macro. Not necessarily with 7D, it was already present since at least 400D (but most likely much earlier).

I believe that it is explained that the doubling of the sampling rate in AI servo is only so for a 7D with a Canon macro lens (hence no sigma or so) and a magnification greater than 33%.
 

Similar threads

What Causes the Angle-Insensitive Colors in Bird Feathers and Butterfly Wings?
Replies
6
Views
1K
These new "LED Trucks" are distracting....
Replies
15
Views
1K
How do you deal with not getting proper credit?
Replies
12
Views
2K
I Another butterfly making tornadoes thread
Replies
21
Views
3K
How Do Monarch Butterflies Navigate Their Epic Migration?
Replies
5
Views
4K
Here is a weird moth larva
Replies
2
Views
3K
Got these image puzzles at university and couldn't solve half of them
Replies
14
Views
2K
Can I save anything in my greenhouse from frost damage?
Replies
11
Views
2K
Should I Keep a Butterfly Named Henry as My Friend?
Replies
7
Views
2K
There is this woman I like to date, but
Replies
22
Views
7K

Hot Threads

Recent Insights

Back
Top