What’s your most challenging subject as a photographer? Do you chase the perfect lighting for your landscape photos or pursue the decisive moment in your street shots or wait endlessly for an elusive creature to appear?
At least several times a year, I will attempt to photograph dragonflies in flight. Dragonflies are small, fast, and agile. Some of them seem utterly unpredictable and almost impossible to track or fly high in the air, out of range of even long telephoto lenses.
What’s an ideal scenario? In the best of all worlds, I would like to find a dragonfly that flies a repeated route, such as patrolling a portion of a stream, and periodically hovers at my eye level or below.
Yesterday I spotted a dragonfly as I was following a stream in a remote part of my favorite marshland park. The dragonfly would hover for a while and then move a short distance away and hover again.
I was pretty excited as I put my camera to my eye and tried to find the dragonfly in the viewfinder. With my zoom lens extended to 600mm, it’s a little like looking through a straw—there is a pretty limited field of view. I set my focus to manual mode, having learned in the past that it is almost impossible for me to gain and hold focus on small moving subjects in auto mode. One of the challenges of the Tamron 150-600mm lens is that the focus ring is at the back of the lens near the lens mount, which means that it is tough to hold the lens steady and focus manually.
The dragonfly was cooperative and gave me a number of chances before it flew away. When the magical moments ended, I looked at a few of my images on the back of my camera and couldn’t immediately identify the dragonfly. Initially I thought it was a Mocha Emerald, like the one that I seen near that same location earlier in September, but the coloration and body shape was all wrong. Once I got home, I did a little research and figured out that I had photographed a Shadow Darner (Aeshna umbrosa), a call confirmed by local dragonfly expert Walter Sanford.
I am pretty happy with these shots. I know that I was lucky to see this dragonfly, but I also know that the hours and hours that I have spent shooting with this camera and lens helped me to take advantage of the situation. A combination of luck, patience, and a bit of skill—it sounds like a good recipe for handling your most challenging subjects as a photographer.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
Great shots, I’m still at struggling with birds lol….not ready for dragonflies yet
Thanks, Julie. I’ll be switching to birds as well when it gets too cold for insects. Birds have their own set of challenges and are often even tougher to photograph than dragonflies (so many birds are really skittish).
It’s the quick part that usually doe’s me in
Great shots!
Good for you with those mid-air dragonfly captures. I haven’t gotten any that I’m satisfied with.
Thanks, Steve. I’ll be out soon trying again with Green Darners that are getting ready to migrate south.
Very nice captures Mike!
Lovely shots. I love the motion in the wings that you’ve captured. Your dragonflies cooperate in front of the camera more than my kids do.
Thanks, Laura. The motion of the wings was not totally intentional-my shutter speed was a lot slower than it should have been. Fortunately the dragonfly was hovering, so the body was more or less in focus, even if the wings aren’t. As for the kids, I grew up in a family of nine kids and know well what a challenge it is to get more than one cooperating at a time.
Wow. Nine. I’m one of eight kids but with large enough gaps between us that all eight of us never lived at home at once.
Are you familiar with cottonwood trees and the seed they shed? I once capture a puffy seed floating thru the air along a stream. I tried for a bout an hour and finally nailed it – tack sharp. Thankfully the cottonwood trees are plentiful and were shedding like made that day which made it easier. Dragonflies though – they dart all over the place. Wow Mike; nice get. Congrats.
I don’t have a lot of experience with cottonwood trees, but I know what the seeds look like. I can imagine trying to photograph the puffy seeds in the air. Wow! I think we all are a little strange in the way we enjoy these little challenges–most people would give up after a few tries.
Very nice rewards, Mike. I think my favorite challenge is to get a hoverfly in flight. I got one perfectly a couple of summers ago and have been trying to get another ever since.
Wow. A hoverfly is a whole lot smaller than a dragonfly. Happy hunting. It reminds me of the Karate Kid movie wand trying to catch a fly with chopsticks.
Good catch. I know you’ve hunted for this dragon for more than a year. Persistence pays off, Mike!
Thanks, Walter. You know well how much I have been on the lookout for this dragonfly and others. I’m still hoping for a Dragonhunter, but that may have to wait until next year.
Amazing capture Mike! Persistence pays off
Thanks. Somethings things work together and I manage to get some good shots. I don’t consider myself to be super skilled, but I am really persistent.
Great shots! I’ve tried that a couple of times and had no luck.
I do not know how you get these amazing shots. I am never able to catch them when they are still enough to get even reasonable images.
Thanks, Charlie. I have no special skills, but I have a pretty good amount of patience and persistence and I have practiced tracking moving birs and insects. However, that only gets me so far–a lot of luck is needed too.