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Skipper on a jagged leaf

Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Portraits, tagged butterfly, Canon 50D, Fiery Skipper, Fiery Skipper butterfly, Huntley Meadows Park, Hylephila phyleus, skipper, Tamron 180mm macro on August 11, 2013| 7 Comments »

Every now and then I take a photograph and I am not really sure how I achieved the effect in the shot, like this one of a Fiery Skipper butterfly (Hylephila phyleus) on a jagged leaf.

With the exception of a few minor adjustments of the RAW image and a tiny bit of cropping, this looks just like the image I started with. When I first examined the image, I was pretty sure that I had used flash, but the EXIF data indicate that flash was not used. I took the shot handheld at ISO 400, f/6.3, and 1/500 sec. The depth of field was pretty shallow, but I did get the eye pretty much in focus, and I like the way the sharpness falls off so quickly.

I especially like the blurry jagged back edge of the leaf and the sharper near edge. The triangular shape of the wings seems to mirror those jags. Even the butterfly’s pose seems to work well, with the one leg dangling over the edge. If you click on the image, you get a higher resolution view of the photo.

I think that this is a Fiery Skipper, though I confess that I am not very good at identifying these little butterflies. Let me know if you can help in further identifying the butterfly.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Orange and pink

Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Great Spangled Fritillary, Huntley Meadows Park, Speyeria cybele, Tamron 180mm macro on August 11, 2013| 7 Comments »

Normally I don’t think of orange and pink as colors that work well together, but I really like the result when I captured a shot of a Great Spangled Fritillary butterfly (Speyeria cybele) feeding on an unidentified pink flower.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Green heron out on a limb

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Butorides virescens, Canon 50D, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, green heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park on August 10, 2013| 7 Comments »

The water has gone down in some parts of my local marsh and I encountered this Green Heron (Butorides virescens) in a little tree that overlooked one of the dried out areas.

I am not sure if the heron was hunting or resting, although it looked more like the former than the latter, because he seemed to be looking from side to side. Perhaps he was searching for frogs or some other terrestrial prey.

I did not have my longest telephoto lens on my camera, but I was happy that to get some several decent shot of the little heron in a number of different poses.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Striding heron

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Ardea herodias, Canon 50D, Great Blue Heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park, Sigma 135-400mm telephoto zoom lens on August 10, 2013| 6 Comments »

I had zoomed all the way in on this Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias), when suddenly he took a big stride, a stride that almost took him out of the frame.

Something must have caught his attention, because he started moving quickly after having been still for quite some time. Normally when a blue heron moves, he is striking, reaching down to pull (or spear) some hapless prey out of the water. His lateral movement caught me a little by surprise.

One of the challenges of taking photos of wildlife is to be ready for the unexpected. I’m learning that the more I study subjects like this blue heron, the more I can anticipate some of their action. It’s a whole lot easier to be ready for the expected than for the unexpected.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Tiger Swallowtail on tiger lily

Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged butterfly, Canon 50D, Eastern Tiger, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly, Lilium columbianum, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, Papilio, Tamron 180mm macro, tiger lily, Vienna VA on August 9, 2013| 2 Comments »

I don’t know my flowers very well, but I think that this Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio glaucus) is feeding on some kind of tiger lily (Lilium columbianum). Tiger on tiger—I like the way that sounds. Whatever the case, I love the gorgeous colors of the flowers, providing a gorgeous contrast to those of the butterfly.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Look both ways

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged Barn Swallow, canon 50, Hirundo rustica, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, swallow, Tamron 180mm macro on August 9, 2013| 4 Comments »

I don’t usually think of photographing birds with a macro lens, but that’s exactly what I did when I encountered this Barn Swallow (Hirundo rustica) perched on a small branch, with a beautiful blue sky in the background.

Of course, I probably should note that the macro lens in question is 180mm in focal length, so it has good telephoto capability—I had just never tried to use it in that way. My experience photographing birds this past winter suggests that this lens does not have enough reach for most birds. I was really happy, though, with the detail it was able to capture in this situation, when I was standing almost directly below the bird.

Mentally it was an adjustment to be shooting with a prime lens and I had to keep reminding myself that if I wanted to adjust the composition, I had to change my position and move closer or farther away. That’s probably a good thing to remember when I am using a zoom lens, which has a tendency to make me a little lazy.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Swallowtails and blue sky

Posted in Art, Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged butterflies, Canon 50D, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, Papilio glaucus, Tamron 180mm macro, Vienna VA on August 8, 2013| 3 Comments »

The weather this week has been mostly gray and dreary and I felt the need for a burst of bright colors, so I am posting this image from last week of a two Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterflies (Papilio glaucus) feeding on an unidentified flower against the backdrop of a brilliant blue sky. The butterflies were even cooperative enough to place themselves at different angles to add visual interest to the shot.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Wasp and sky

Posted in Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Canon 50D, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, Tamron 180mm macro, Vienna VA, wasp on August 8, 2013| 9 Comments »

The wasp looked huge, even from a distance, but I could get a clear shot of it against a beautiful blue sky, so I stepped out of my comfort zone and got close enough to it to get these images.

Fortunately I was shooting with a 180mm macro lens, so I was not exactly on top of the wasp, but even so, it was a little disconcerting to try to get a shot of a moving insect that looked so enormous and a bit threatening in the viewfinder.

After I took these shots, the wasp flew away and I breathed a sigh of relief—another sting avoided.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Inquisitive muskrat

Posted in animals, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Huntley Meadows Park, muskrat, Ondatra zibethicus on August 7, 2013| 17 Comments »

It has been a while since I featured a mammal in my blog, so I thought that I would post a photo of this little muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus) that I encountered this past weekend at my local marsh. I observes muskrats there fairly often, but most of the time they are swimming away or are submerging themselves by the time my camera is ready.

This muskrat was poking about at the edge of a formerly inhabited beaver lodge when I first caught sight of him. He did not immediately perceive my presence, so I was able to creep close enough to him to get this shot using my 55-250mm zoom lens.

Unlike the beavers, which sleep during daylight hours, muskrats are active when it its light—in theory it should be easy to get a good shot of a muskrat. The reality, though, is that muskrats are small, fast, and elusive, so I have not yet been able to get many good shots of them.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Appalachian Brown butterfly

Posted in Art, Butterflies, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Appalachian brown butterfly, butterfly, Canon 50D, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Huntley Meadows Park, Satyrodes appalachia on August 7, 2013| 14 Comments »

When I am chasing after little butterflies, it’s rare that I manage to get a shot of them with their wings open—I am lucky if I can get a side view.

This little brown butterfly, which I think is an Appalachian Brown (Satyrodes appalachia), perched in a location, however, which allowed me to shoot downward, catching its wings wide open. The muddy, brown water of the marsh normally would not be optimal for an image, but seem to work well here, almost matching the colors of the butterfly.

I also was able to get a shot from the side, the second image, showing the butterfly’s beautiful brown eyes. There was intermittent rain the day that I was shooting and you can see a few raindrops on the leaves of the plant on which the butterfly is perched.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Rainbow grasshopper

Posted in Art, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged blue eyes, Canon 50D, Handsome Meadow Katydid, Huntley Meadows Park, katydid, neon-colored grasshopper, Orchelimum pulchellum, rainbow grasshopper, Tamron 180mm macro on August 6, 2013| 16 Comments »

Let me introduce you to the coolest-looking insect I have ever encountered, the Handsome Meadow Katydid (Orchelimum pulchellum), an insect that I photographed this past weekend at my local marsh. The name just seems to fit the insect perfectly, unlike so many other insects that seem to have been named almost randomly.

I still recall the first time that I encountered a Handsome Meadow Katydid last summer and the resulting double take—I could not believe what my eyes were seeing. The bright colors of the body were astonishing and seemed so unreal that one of my friends wondered if I had colorized the photo.

It’s the eyes, though, that make this insect so attractive for me. There is just something so alluring about those blue eyes, eyes that I don’t expect to see in an insect.

I got some pretty good shots of Handsome Meadow Katydids last year, but was growing concerned that I would not see many this year (you can tell it’s a katydid, in part, because of the length of the antennae). I actually heard this katydid before I saw it. I was passing by a small bush and hear a kind of vibrating sound. I put my ear closer and closer to the plant and finally spotted the source.

I had to go pretty wide in cropping the shot, because the katydid was stretched out along the small branch. Click on the image if you want see a higher resolution view of the photo, including those amazing eyes.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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My favorite dragonfly

Posted in Art, Dragonflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, Celithemis eponina, dragonfly, halloween pennant, Halloween Pennant dragonfly, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, Tamron 180mm macro, Vienna VA on August 5, 2013| 5 Comments »

Yesterday I was happy to get some shots of my favorite dragonfly, the Halloween Pennant dragonfly (Celithemis eponina), at Meadowlark Botanical Gardens in Vienna, Virginia.

I don’t see this dragonfly at all at most of the usual places where I take photographs, so I was really excited when I caught sight of a couple of them yesterday. I chased them around for well over an hour and attempted to take a couple of hundred shots using a wide range of camera settings.

Why did I take so many photos? The dragonfly gets the “pennant” part of its name because it likes to perch on the very tip of a weed stalk and waves in the breeze like a pennant. Yesterday, in fact, was breezy and it was quite an adventure trying to keep the dragonfly in focus, particularly because I was trying to fill the frame with the dragonfly.

The dragonflies that I photographed were reasonably cooperative and I was able to attempt shots from the side, from above, and even from below (fortunately the insects in the grass did not bite very often).

I have not been able to go through the shot to pick the best ones, but thought it would be nice to post one now, especially for those readers who may not be familiar with this beautiful dragonfly. I suspect that I will eventually post at least a couple more images in future postings.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Sunflowers make me happy

Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Landscape, Nature, Photography, tagged Canon 50D, Canon 50mm lens, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Canon Rebel XT, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly, happy, McKee-Beshers Wildlife Management Area, Papilio glaucus, sunflowers, swallowtail on August 4, 2013| 9 Comments »

Different flowers affect me differently—some attract me with their beauty or their fragrance or their colors. Others produce an emotional response, like sunflowers, which invariably make me feel happy.

The sunflower’s large size, bright colors, and bold graphic design appeal to me. The sunflower virtually shouts its presence to the world—there is nothing soft and delicate and hidden about a sunflower.

Like this Easter Tiger Swallowtail butterfly (Papilio glaucus), I sometimes enjoy the flowers one at a time. It was really fun, though, to visit a large field of sunflowers last month with some friends and to see row after row of these cheery flowers. I wanted to capture a group shot of the sunflowers, but I struggled to find a way to do so effectively (even though we had even brought along a little stepladder to give us a perspective from above the flowers).

In the end, my favorite shot (the second one below) focuses on a single sunflower, with other flowers a blur in the background. I used a simple 50mm lens (often called the “nifty fifty”) on my camera to make sure that I could control the aperture and throw the background out of focus.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Fuzzy white caterpillar

Posted in Bugs, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Canon 50D, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, caterpillar, fuzzy caterpillar, Huntley Meadows Park on August 3, 2013| 23 Comments »

It’s hard enough to identify moths and butterflies when they are fully grown—it seems almost impossible to do so when they are caterpillars, like this fuzzy white caterpillar that I encountered today at my local marshland park.

The caterpillar had so much long hair that it was hard to see the actual body, which might have been quite small for all I could tell. It was crawling around in the cattails on a day that featured intermittent rain. If you look closely at the first shot, you can see little water drops near what I think is the area of the head.

The second shot may look like it was done with flash, but the darker background was caused merely by changing the settings on my camera and deliberately overexposing the image.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Kung Fu grasshopper

Posted in Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Portraits, wildlife, tagged Canon 50D, grasshopper, Huntley Meadows Park, Kung Fu, Tamron 180mm macro on August 3, 2013| 6 Comments »

I haven’t seen many grasshoppers this summer, so I was happy to get a few shots of this one before he hopped off the leafy stalk for a new destination. I especially like the details of the eyes and the mouth.

Grasshoppers are special to me, in part because “grasshopper” is the term that my photograph mentor, Cindy Dyer, uses for me, her student. Some of you may be old enough to remember the television series Kung Fu from the 1970’s, in which Master Po, the blind monk, called his young pupil “grasshopper.”

I often wondered why he used that particular word and today I came across an explanation in Wikipedia. Apparently it stemmed from an exchange between the Master Po and the student, Caine, in the pilot episode of the series. There is a lot of wisdom in that final response.

Master Po: Close your eyes. What do you hear?
Young Caine: I hear the water, I hear the birds.
Po: Do you hear your own heartbeat?
Caine: No.
Po: Do you hear the grasshopper which is at your feet?
Caine: Old man, how is it that you hear these things?
Po: Young man, how is it that you do not?

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Destructive beetle

Posted in Bugs, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Canon 50D, destructive, Huntley Meadows Park, Japanese beetle, Popillia japonica, Tamron 180mm macro on August 2, 2013| 8 Comments »

Japanese beetles (Popillia japonica) are very destructive, but also very beautiful and I sought to highlight both of these aspects in this image.

There were quite a few plant with holes chewed in them in one area of the marsh and I suspect that Japanese beetles were the culprits (this one sure looks guilty). I like the coloration and the reflectiveness of the insect’s body. I’m not completely sure, but I think that I see my own reflection as well as the sky in the part of the shell near the beetle’s head.

This was a situation in which I really enjoyed having my new 180mm macro lens. It allowed me to frame it the way in which I wanted without scaring away the beetle (and I did not have to do much cropping at all).

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Face in the flowers

Posted in Dragonflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Blue Dasher, Blue Dasher dragonfly, brookside gardens, Canon 50D, dragonfly, Pachydiplax longipennis, Tamron 180mm macro, Wheaton MD on August 2, 2013| 8 Comments »

I don’t often see dragonflies perched on flowers, so I was really happy when this male Blue Dasher dragonfly (Pachydiplax longipennis) decided to take a break on something more attractive than the usual broken swamp reed.

If you look closely at the dragonfly’s face (or click on the photo for higher resolution), you can see some interesting details, like his cute little bucktooth and some sparse sprouting hairs on his chin, like those of a human teenager. I also like the contrast in color between the blues and greens of his body and the pink of the flowers.

Why did the dragonfly choose to land on the flower? It almost looks like he is helping with pollination, but I suspect that is not the case. The answer to the question is probably much more simple—he landed on it, because it was there.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Please take me home

Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged butterfly, Canon 50D, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Maryland, McKee-Beshers Wildlife Management Area, Montgomery County on August 1, 2013| 5 Comments »

As I was ending a photo shoot of sunflowers last month with some fellow photographers, one of them noticed a pretty butterfly perched on a leg of one of our tripods.

The butterfly remained on the tripod leg for a long time and appeared to be licking the leg, prompting us to speculate that there might be residual salt from sweaty hands on the leg. Of course, we all gathered around the tripod and tried to snap photos of the butterfly. Eventually the butterfly flew off to some nearby vegetation, where I got this shot of a butterfly that I have not been able to identify.

As we go ready to walk back to our vehicle, the butterfly perched on the pant leg of one of the other photographers and then on my shirt before flying away again. After stowing our gear in the trunk, we figured that we had seen the last of the butterfly.

However, as we were slowly driving away, we noticed that the butterfly was inside the car, eventually moving to the windshield, right in front of the driver. We helped the butterfly out of the car with the aid of a CD cover, but had to admire its persistence—the butterfly really seemed to want to go home with us.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Summer Azure butterfly

Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged azure butterfly, Canon 50D, Celastrina neglecta, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, summer azure, SUmmer Azure butterfly, Tamron 180mm macro, Vienna VA on August 1, 2013| 12 Comments »

Tiny butterflies seem to be constantly in motion and their size and speed normally make them difficult to photograph.

However, this butterfly, which I think may be a Summer Azure butterfly (Celastrina neglecta), stayed perched on a Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta) long enough to allow me and my fellow photographer, Cindy Dyer, to take multiple shots, including some with flash. There is a whole family of small Azure butterflies, which have a wingspan of about one inch (25mm) and look pretty similar, so please correct me if I have misidentified this insect.

We encountered this little butterfly on a recent trip to Meadowlark Botanical Gardens in Vienna, Virginia. (You can check out Cindy’s image of this butterfly, along with her amazing photographs of other flowers and insects on her blog.)

I love large, colorful butterflies, like the Eastern Tiger Swallowtails that were virtually omnipresent in the garden that day, but there is something really special too about the delicate beauty and simple colors of this tiny butterfly. In this image, I like the way in which the muted tones of the butterfly provide a nice visual counterbalance to the bold colors of the flower.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Heron over the marsh

Posted in Birds, Flowers, Gardening, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Ardea herodias, birds in flight, blue heron, Canon 50D, Great Blue Heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park, Sigma 135-400mm telephoto zoom lens on July 31, 2013| 4 Comments »

I have always thought that Great Blue Herons (Ardea herodias) look a bit awkward on the ground, tall and gangly, but they are exceptionally beautiful in the air.

As I approached this blue heron yesterday at my local marshland park, it decided to take off. I often try to capture photos of birds in flight, though generally I’ve had only limited success.

I was pretty happy with this shot, taken shortly after the heron had taken to the air. The shaded woods make a decent backdrop and I like the blooming mallow flowers in the foreground. The focusing is a little soft, but I was able to capture some of the magnificent details of the visible wing.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Hidden heron

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, wildlife, tagged Butorides virescens, Canon 50D, green heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park, Sigma 135-400mm telephoto zoom lens on July 31, 2013| 3 Comments »

Can you spot the heron in this photo?

I think that you probably can pick out the Green Heron (Butorides virescens), which blends in pretty well with the vegetation, a little easier than I was able to do, when I visited my local marshland yesterday. The heron, which I think might be a young one, was foraging about in the marsh plants, unlike other Green Herons that I have seen in the past, which tended to stand near the edge of the water awaiting prey. If the heron had not moved, I might not have seen him, because it was so close to the ground.

I really like the colors of the Green Heron and its distinctive yellow eyes. The Green Heron may not be as big in size as a Great Blue Heron, but it has its own beauty—maybe I should begin a campaign to change its name to Great Green Heron.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Stained glass butterfly

Posted in Art, Butterflies, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged backlighting, butterfly, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly, Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, Papilio glaucus, stained glass, Vienna VA on July 30, 2013| 3 Comments »

As the beautiful afternoon light illuminated the wings of this Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly (Papilio glaucus) from behind, I couldn’t help but think of a stained glass window. I love backlighting and these subjects seemed perfect to showcase the effect—I didn’t even have to worry about using fill flash to avoid shadows, because of the translucency of the wings.

I took this image yesterday at Meadowlark Botanical Gardens in Vienna, Virginia, yet another wonderful local spot for photographing flowers and insects.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Shadowy osprey

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, Cameron Run, Canon 50D, Osprey, shadows, Sigma 135-400mm telephoto zoom lens on July 30, 2013| 4 Comments »

I never fail to be excited by the sight of a large, powerful bird soaring through the air.

Earlier this month, as I was walking along Cameron Run, a tributary of the Potomac River, I spotted a bird heading right toward me. It kept getting bigger and bigger as it approached and I suspected it was a hawk or an eagle—it turned out to be an osprey. Fortunately I had my largest telephoto zoom lens, a Sigma 135-400mm, already on my camera and, after a few adjustments, I started snapping away.

I was shooting almost directly into the sun, so much of the detail of the osprey’s body are hidden in the shadows, but I was able to capture some of the details of its amazing wings, with a little backlighting. Click on the images to see a higher resolution view of some of these details.

It may seem that I am photographing insects and spiders these days, judging from my blog postings, but I continue to enjoy photographing birds. In fact, photographing birds in flight is one of the specific areas in which I hope to improve, so these photos may be a preview of coming attractions once summer is over.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Praying mantis

Posted in Art, Humor, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, Portraits, tagged Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, mantis, praying mantis, Tamron 180mm macro on July 29, 2013| 17 Comments »

Praying mantises blend in so well with their surroundings that it is extremely rare for me to see one. This past weekend I spotted one as I was scanning the undergrowth while I was walking along the boardwalk in my local marsh.

The challenge for me was to figure out how to get a good shot of the praying mantis, which was sitting among some green leaves just about level with the boardwalk itself. I first tried shooting from directly above the insect, but I didn’t like the results very much, because I could not seem to make the praying mantis stand out from the background.

The second basic approach that I tried was to shoot at eye level with the insect. This produced some good results, like the second photo below, because I was able to capture a lot of details of the mantis and the shadows add interest to the shot.

I got my favorite image, the first one, when I shot from below the level of the insect, by hanging over the edge of the boardwalk. Framing the shot was a bit tricky because I had to place myself in the middle of the vegetation without disturbing the praying mantis (you should never disturb an insect when it is praying). I also had to shoot from an awkward angle in which it was difficult to steady the camera, so many of my shots were blurry.

Why is the first image my favorite? I like the simplicity of the color palette in the image−mostly green and black—and the pose of the praying mantis staring into the shadows from the edge of the leaf, which has wonderful details. (If you click on the image you can see a higher resolution view, which includes some details of insect’s head.)

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Spiders are everywhere…

Posted in Arachnids, Humor, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Canon 50D, Huntley Meadows Park, Tamron 180mm macro on July 28, 2013| 7 Comments »

Every since I got my new 180mm macro lens, it seems like the spider population has increased. That’s an exaggeration, of course, but somehow my new lens has caused me to be hypersensitive to spiders and insects within range of the new lens and I find myself filled with an almost irresistible urge to photograph them when I encounter them.

I saw this spider alongside a path at my local marshland park and gave in to the urge. As you can probably tell, I used flash to add a little light to the spider. I probably need to diffuse the flash more, so there is not quite as much glare, but I am happy with the way the background turned out—I think the combination of black and green works well with the colors of the spider.

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Crawling out

Posted in Art, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged bee, brookside gardens, Canon 50D, purple water lily, Tamron 180mm macro, water lily, Wheaton MD on July 28, 2013| 4 Comments »

A bee landed on a petal of this purple water lily and, rather than heading for the center of the flower, the obvious source for pollen, decided to crawl down in between the petals.

I followed his movements and, after a short time, those movements ceased—I think he was stuck. Eventually the plant began to move again, this time more violently. Slowly the bee reemerged, crawling slowly up the petal, and I took this shot.

I find the tones of this image to be very soothing and purple is one of my favorite colors. If you too like purple, check out today’s postings called Violetta at Calee Photography, one of my favorite blogs.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Butterfly in Cindy’s garden

Posted in Art, Butterflies, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged Alexandria VA, butterfly, Cabbage White, Cabbage White butterfly, Canon 50D, Pieris rapae, Tamron 180mm macro on July 27, 2013| 5 Comments »

As I waited outside my neighbors’ townhouse so that we could travel to an indoor butterfly exhibit, I tried out my new macro lens in their garden and ended up with of my best butterfly shots of the day.

Cabbage White butterflies (Pieris rapae) are very common, but they are elusive when you try to photograph them. I managed to squeeze off only two shots before the butterfly flew away, but this shot illustrates why I love my 180mm macro so much. The small butterfly filled up much of the frame without me having to get right on top of it. The lens also captured a pretty good amount of detail too. If you click on the image, you can see some of the details of the butterfly’s green eye, for example.

Almost exactly a year ago, my photography mentor and muse, Cindy Dyer, in whose garden I photographed this butterfly, challenged me to get a good image of a Cabbage White butterfly. A year later, I feel pretty confident in saying that I have met that particular challenge.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Peaceful coexistence

Posted in Butterflies, Flowers, Insects, Nature, Photography, tagged bumblebee, Canon 50D, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly, McKee-Beshers Wildlife Management Area, Papilio glaucus, sunflower on July 27, 2013| 9 Comments »

The sunflower was big enough that an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly (Papilio glaucus) and a bumblebee could peacefully coexist, though it looks like they had each carved out their individual spheres of influence and kept a respectful distance from each other.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Hummingbird Clearwing (part 2)

Posted in Art, commentary, Flowers, Gardening, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged brookside gardens, Canon 50D, Hemaris thysbe, Hummingbird Clearwing, Hummingbird Clearwing Moth, Tamron 180mm macro, Wheaton MD on July 27, 2013| 14 Comments »

Is photography an art or a science? One of the reasons why I enjoy photography so much is that it engages me on both levels—it speaks to my inner artist and to my inner geek.

Growing up, I remember watching Olympic figure skating and I was struck by the fact that the skaters received two sets of scores, one for “artistic impression” and one for “technical merit.” In many ways, I use a similar internal scoring system for my photographs.

Some of my photographs rate high on one scale, but fall short on the other. Every now and then, though, one of my images stands out, with high marks all around, like this shot of a Hummingbird Clearwing Moth (Hemaris thysbe).

I posted an earlier photo of this remarkable insect and I thought it was really cool that I was able to get a close-up with the wings open and frozen in action, a somewhat impressive technical feat. This image, shot from a bit farther away, gives a better view of the moth in action and is a more interesting pose. The background, which I recall was evergreen bushes, is uncluttered. Even the flower cooperated by following the “odd rule” of composition, with three clusters of tiny flowers.

It’s hard to be objective when analyzing my own work, but I know that I like this image a lot.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Heron catches crayfish (?)

Posted in Birds, Nature, Photography, tagged Ardea herodias, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Canon Rebel XT, crayfish, Great Blue Heron, heron, Huntley Meadows Park on July 26, 2013| 12 Comments »

I enjoy watching Great Blue Herons (Ardea herodias) fishing—they seem so patient and so focused—and observed one recently in the beaver pond at my local marsh.

I was a little surprised to see the heron at that location, because the water level in the pond has dropped as the weather has gotten hotter and some areas are even exposed. As the heron plunged his bill into the shallow water, I expected him to pull out a frog or perhaps a small fish. I was too far away to tell for sure what he had caught, but I kept shooting. When I looked at the images, it looks like he may have caught a crayfish, but I am not really sure. Do herons even eat crayfish? I took the photos in the middle of the day, so the colors are washed out a bit, but some more knowledgeable reader may still be able to tell me for sure if it is a crayfish in the heron’s mouth. (You can get a higher resolution view if you click on the image.)

The second photo was taken before the heron began fishing and gives you an idea of how shallow the water is in the beaver pond. In post processing, I made a number of tweaks to the image to try to increase the contrast and saturation of the colors and may have gone over the top a little. What do you think?

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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Red Admiral

Posted in Butterflies, Insects, Macro Photography, Nature, Photography, tagged butterfly, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Canon Rebel XT, cattails, Huntley Meadows Park, Red Admiral, Red Admiral butterfly, Vanessa atalanta on July 26, 2013| 4 Comments »

I am finally starting to see more butterflies, like this Red Admiral butterfly (Vanessa atalanta) that I spotted recently in the cattails at my local marsh.

It seems like we had a slow start this year with butterflies compared with last year and I had been fearful that I would not be treated to their colorful displays that I enjoy so much. Gradually my concerns are disappearing as I see different varieties appear and I am happy that I can even identify some of them.

Sharp-eyed readers might notice that something does not look quite right with this photo. I rotated the image ninety degrees, because I found myself cocking my head when the butterfly was pointing downward.

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved

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