Of bugs, flowers, and muddy lenses

I came home from hours of driving in the hot sun, in the front door and straight out the back to the shady garden. So cool! So green! So easy on the eyes! So buggy! I went back in for the camera and macro lens.

Fly on London Pride flowers

Delicate bloom of London Pride. Taken with macro lens.

American House spider. One of Fat Momma's great-greats.

While I was up on a ladder taking this photo, I dropped the camera. It was on a cord around my neck, so no harm done, but the macro lens fell off, landed in the damp mud of the garden, and split in half. This isn't as bad as it sounds; it's a home-made stack, which cost me nothing but work. I can fix it, given a slow, rainy day.

But I needed it for bugs. Or maybe not; I went in and brought out my old Olympus (SP55OUZ), which I had almost stopped using, because it got dust inside the lens. (At London Drugs, where I bought it, they told me the repair would cost more than the camera.) Sometimes, especially if I use the flash, the spots show up on the photo. But it takes good macro photos, as long as I remove the spots later.

I decided to experiment; take the same photo with the little Sony (Cybershot) and with the Olympus, then compare them.

Petunia. With the Sony. The Olympus needs more light.

Dutchman's Breeches. With the Sony.

Harvestman on hydrangea leaf. Sony

Harvestman under hydrangea leaf. With the Olympus. Almost enough light.

Tiny Cross spider. With the Olympus and flash. I couldn't get close enough to focus with the Sony without scaring the spider away.

Rhododendron buds. Sony. The Olympus doesn't like extreme lighting.

Ant in center of rhododendron. Sony. Not enough light for the Olympus. It doesn't allow flash with Super-Macro.

Bee on rhodo bud. Note the yellow pollen sac on his leg. Sony. The Olympus was 'way too slow.

Rhododendrons in the shade with sunlit trees behind. Almost looks artificial. Sony, again.

The upshot of all this is that I am still happy with the little Sony; it's fast, it's light, and it handles contrasts well. I can take photos one-handed, which helps when I'm up ladders. On the downside, it doesn't focus if the surroundings are too busy, and the flash is unpredictable. When it all works, it's great. But I need to keep using the Olympus; given enough light and time, it does much better on tiny bugs, as long as they're sitting still.

And maybe, when I rebuild the macro lens, I can adjust it more carefully to the Sony. I think I'll put it on a strap, too.

Shrimp feathers, crumpled moth, eye of hermit...

I've been experimenting with settings and lens configurations on the baby Sony. I'm still impressed with what a tiny point-and-shoot can do. These are a few samples from tonight's work.

Through the glass of the aquarium:

Eye of hermit. Big Blue, IIRC.

Carapace of smallest shrimp, with one fuzzy eye. The carapace is transparent. I think the pinkish blob is a stomach. But what are those feathery shapes behind it?*

*Gills. Hugh explains in the comments.

Looking down a hermit's throat.

With this arrangement - camera lens zoomed to its maximum, homemade lens attached in front - I have very little leeway. The field is shallow, and the subject has to be less than 1 1/2 inches away. At least, in this camera, the flash works even nose to nose. That helps.

And I keep a couple of long-dead, dry-land critters to practice on:

Crumpled 1/2 inch long moth.

And a faded, dusty carpet beetle. 1 mm. long. I don't seem to find any live ones these days.

The whole moth, taken with all automatic settings and no extra lens.

Next, I'll take apart my lens, clean it, and rebuild it for a tighter fit. And hope I don't ruin it in the process.

Babies, stick-in-the-muds, and Big Blue

It rained or blew all day. I puttered around, doing laundry and other uninspiring chores, and then rewarded myself, playing with my new toy, the little Sony Laurie bought me.

These are more or less random shots from the aquarium (random, in that I pointed the camera at anything that found itself a decent background.) with the camera still set on automatic everything, but without flash.

Ma Crab, in berry again. Showing off the feathery swimmerets that hold the developing eggs.

Close view of the babies. The eggs are transparent, so the eyes are visible.

These photos worked out much better than the ones I was taking with the Olympus, mostly because the camera is so fast and steady; Ma Crab kept moving about, but I was still able to get several decent shots, even this close.

Big Blue

Nothing needed to be adjusted in this photo but the white balance, to cope with the mixed lighting I was using. And, of course, cropping and resizing for the blog.

The small, stay-at-home anemones on the far wall.

The big, wandering anemone. I think he's grown another half-inch since he moved close to the pump.

I did clean this one up, just a bit, to reduce a too-bright light shining through the water surface at the upper left. There's still a hint of camera reflection, which I left untouched, and a few floaters. And again, cropping, white balance, and resizing.

I am more impressed with the camera with every session. So far, it's living up to the salesman's spiel.