Photographing Insects - Hand-held Photography

In terms of wildlife, insects are probably my least photographed subject, so this year I really wanted to try and get some decent images - namely butterlies, dragonflies and bees.A recent trip to a nature reserve proved to be a little quiet for butterflies and dragonflies, but there was a good number of buzzing bees and hoverflies to practice on.

There are different techniques when it comes to insect photography: some photographers prefer to search for their insects early in the morning and get up close whilst they are still resting. This approach is great - if you can find the insects roosting! The other method is once its warmed up - by waiting by a productive spot, then capturing the insect as it visits a flower head or returns to a favoured perch. Whichever method you choose, insect photography is a real challenge. Shoot at first light and you can find yourself with very low shutter speeds - and moving in a tripod can easily disturb the subject. Photograph later in the day and you almost certainly have increased breeze, along with much more active subjects making them difficult to track. Lighting is an issue too: once the sun is high in the sky, the light becomes too harsh for my liking. After a couple of days photograping the same patch - I think I've decided my prefered technique. The best conditions, I believe, are warm days with high cloud. This gives good quality of lighting whilst still giving you reasonably fast shutter speeds. In addition - the insects seem to slow down, as opposed to a day of bright sunshine. On one particular afternoon the light was rather overcast, but it was still very warm. The many bees, hoverflies and gatekeepers were still active, but they definitely seemed to show slower movements, making it much easier to get close.

 Hand-holding the camera is simply the best option in this kind of situation. Even if you are waiting by a favoured patch of flowers, you never quite know where the insect will land - and you may want to adjust your position for a better composition. Rating the ISO at about 400 can give you an aperture of around f8 with a shutter speed of around 1/250 if the light is right.

 These images were taken in more overcast conditions with shutter speeds down to 1/100 second in some cases. Even then - with little breeze, a lot of care and continuous firing, I was able to gain some pin sharp images which proves that it is possible to capture insects without extremely fast shutter speeds - and hand-held.

Photographing Damselflies

Yesterday morning saw me by a sheltered pond in West Yorkshire, literally teeming with insect life. It's a recently discovered location - and one that is brimming with butterflies, moths and damselflies. The conditions started off well: a lovely still morning with intermittent sunshine breaking through the low cloud. Damselflies were just everywhere, buzzing around the spiky grasses and resting on the low growing plants that fringe the pond. I've always found it difficult to get close enough to the damselflies - they seem particularly skittish.. But perhaps they were just beginning to warm up and not quite at their full speed. Either way, I was able to get extremely close to a number of them as they rested on various perches. I shot towards the light wherever I could, hand-holding the camera and shooting at about 1/250 at f7.1 on ISO 200. As the breeze picked up, photographing insects became increasingly difficult until virtually impossible... this is one of the virtues of an early start as it's the best time to achieve the the stillness that is so important for insect photography.

Nature Photography Workshop Fairburn Ings

Yesterday's nature photography workshop at Fairburn Ings, Yorkshire went really well. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The group was full and I think everyone enjoyed the day's photography. Some of the group's nature photographs can be viewed at my wildlife and landscape photography group on flickr Yorkshire Wildlife and Landscape Photography - thanks to those who uploaded their images. There are some cracking close ups including dragonflies, butterflies and moths. We even had a pair of common blues mating which really made the day!!

Insects at last!

Over the years I've never really been massively into insects. Not that I've anything against them - it's just that I much prefer photographing my bigger birds and mammals. That said, I've still tried to get some decent shots, and I know that invertebrates will be useful for illustrating articles etc.

The last couple of summers saw a combination of increased effort on my part, along with two of the wettest summers on record. That put pay to my aims to increase my butterfly and dragonfly portfolio.. This year it's been quite different, and finally my efforts have paid off. I've managed a number of butterflies which I desparately wanted, including the frustrating common blue. Dragonflies however, continue to taunt me. Here's a few successful images - a combination of persistence and timing helping to bag some butterfly shots.

Early morning searches for inactive butterflies has proved pretty fruitless. Therefore my technique for butterfly photography has been pretty standard, usually shooting an hour or two after sunrise and trying to photograph towards the light. My usual technique is to rate at ISO 200 and shoot handheld, often around 1/250 at f8, using my elbows as support whenever possible, and firing a series of shots to increase chances of pin-sharpness.No dragonflies this summer as yet, but a nice colourful image of a damselfly which was very obliging. The light was very harsh so I waited for the cloud to pass over the sun and then shot. Reduced light levels in this case meant shooting at ISO 400 and hand holding at shutter speeds down to 1/125 second - tough to keep it pin sharp but it's possible. A few butterfly species have been a little elusive, including orange tip, but I can't complain too much - it's been a fairly successful year.