Following On

Following on from the mystery photo yesterday I liked the form, lighting and shadows so decided to see what FX Photo Studio PRO for the Mac could do with it. As the object was some what translucent I had positioned the lighting above and slightly behind it.

Greyscale:



Enhanced colour:



Rainbow colouring:



The app has scores of pre-set choices as well as being able to perform some individual manipulation.
There is also a wide choice of frames which can be added.

Finally, the rainbow coloured one was processed in Tiny Planets

 

as a 'rabbit hole'.

Monday Mystery

Another good set of responses to identify last week's object



which was correctly identified by Adrian, The Veg Artist, Kris, Dave, Ellen D, Ragged Rpbin, A Brit in Tennessee and Kev Scott as



a pen / ball point / biro. Well done.

I wonder what you will make of this



If you think you know, or would like to make a guess, please leave your guess in the comments.
They will be revealed, along with the answer, next Monday.

That Virus and Other Bugs

Yesterday I had to nip to my local medical practice to collect my monthly medication. They were taking precautions against spreading the dreaded lurgy. We had to queue outside. They had even put out cones every 2m to keep people an appropriate distance apart. I had arrived early so was first in the queue. A young man, complete with gloves and face mask, asked me my name and address, went inside, collected the tablets and brought them out to me.

More interesting bugs were these woodlice (pill bugs) I found (no sound)



Do you see what I spotted on our daily walkabout?



A shield bug



Most probably a Hawthorn Shield Bug.

A Quick Burst

This time I went in the garden with the 100 - 500mm zoom lens hand held with manual focus. This is the first time I have set the camera to burst mode where it can take up to seven photos a second. I hoped that might give me a better chance of catching an insect in flight. Holding this set up anything near steady is quite a tussle as it weighs about 2.7Kg

First spotted though was this Small Tortoise butterfly resting



Then a hover fly led me a merry dance but out of dozens of flight shots a couple were reasonable.





Resting giving its wings a Spring clean



Finally a Peacock butterfly landed nearby



Feeding on a Dandelion



Another good afternoon in the Sun. Clear sky can mean warm daylight hours. Two days ago it reached 15C. Yesterday about 12C. Clear sky at night is a different matter this time of year. Lowest air temperature in the wee small hours was -2C with a good layer of frost.

All the photos here are small crops.

Pottering Round the Garden ...

... with the Canon 70D plus 17-85mm macro lens in hand to see what was about on a (relatively) warm, sunny afternoon.

Peeling bark on the old leylandii stump



A pair of amorous ladybirds who throught they were hidden from prying eyes



Lots of tiny pollen beetles, especially on the tête-a-tete.



A pretty pink Dianthus



A button daisy



Finally a rather tatty Peacock Butterfly on the Heather



It was lovely to get out in the fresh air without having to wrap up like an Inuit.
As so often happens the thing I went out to photograph eluded me.
I had spotted a Bee-fly hovering several times but it was camera shy.

Buddy

On one afternoon walkabout I spotted a twig on the ground.
What caught my attention was the lichen.
It seemed a good subject for a photo so I took it home.



After a bit of focus stacking:



Once I had the twig in my hand the arrangement of buds seemed photogenic.

A bit more focus stacking later



They looked even more interesting close up, especially the colouring.
The twig was found under an old Ash tree but I don't think it came from that.
The best possibility I could find looking at scores of photos on t'internet was Oak.
As I am useless at identifying trees from buds I am probably way out.

This session the lighting was positioned at about 2 o'clock to give some shadow.

Monday Mystery

Good responses for last week's mystery photo



Not quite a feather duster as suggested by A Brit in Tennessee and Ragged Robin.



Congratulations to  Adrian, Dave, The Veg Artist's husband, Kris and Kev Scott who identified a feather. A Wood Pigeon's I picked up on one of our morning walks.


Three close views for this week's mystery object



which are parts of what?

If you know or want to guess what it is please leave your thoughts in the comments.
They will be revealed, along with the answer, next Monday.

Cypress Close Up

I cut a small section from my tall Cypress tree to take some closer photos.



One of the tiny cones
53 focus stacked RAW shots



A closer general look
74 focus stacked RAW shots


Not sure whether the yellow background photographing nearer green is a symptom of the auto white balance in the M5 camera or the output from the LED lamp. Maybe a bit of both.

In the Background

Backgrounds for macro shots taken indoors needed to be thought about.
For some subjects I like the idea of a single colour like the green used in my last post.
To that end I needed a small frame to which I could attach a coloured A4 sheet.

Looking through my goodie (read junk) pile I found some lengths of plastic box section.



As they were originally for a pole to support an LED garden lamp the only joiners were straight.
I needed right angle corner joints and some feet to stop the assembly from falling over.
Just the project for 3D printing.

Parts were designed in FreeCAD



and the designs process using Cura



to write the instructions for my 3D printer.



It took a few experimental prints before the final design worked as anticipated.



Box sections free standing



A couple of clamps hold an A4 sheet in place



I have a range of coloured sheets I bought about 20 years ago.
I might even get to use some of them now.
I can imagine the possibility of using white sheet with the lighting from behind to make macro silhouettes.
It might be possible to use backgrounds printed from old photographs.
Time to experiment.

Wordless Wednesday

Frogs Have Been Busy

My garden pond is looking a bit full in one quarter



Much of the rest of it is overgrown but with plenty of hiding places for the tadpoles when they appear.

Monday Mystery

I think trying to estimate the size of last week's mystery object sent some on the wrong tack.



It was one of the Tetley Tea Folk's finest



a tea bag.
Congratulations to Kev Scott who gave the only correct answer.
My thanks as always to all who had a go.
 
Now for something completely different, as the saying goes.



This is a close look at what?

If you know or want to have a guess please leave your answer in the comments.
They will be revealed, along with the answer, next Monday.

Ribes sanguineum

The hedge opposite me is starting to come to life after its Winter rest.




One plant caught my eye.
59 focus stacked photos of Ribes sanguineum, the flowering currant.

The Rusty Nut

Still experimenting and improving the macro focus stacking (hopefully).

16 focus stacked RAW photos using Helicon Focus - Method A (weighted average)
There are two other methods of stacking: Depth Map and Pyramid.



The nut measures approximately 12mm across.
For all the previous photos I used an LED anglepoise type lamp for illumination.
This time I used a mains operated LED ring light that I had forgotten all about.
It fits the stacking set up perfectly and has adjustable brilliance.
The camera was set to depth of field priority and manual focus.

Drosera

Drosera is a family of carnivorous plants know as Sundews.

My plant has been growing well in the unheated conservatory.
This is Drosera capensis alba - Cape Sundew

 

It is one of the easiest to grow and is happy with the heat in Summer and the cooler / cold temperatures in the Winter. The main care point is keeping it moist all the time. I always keep the saucer topped up with rain water. During the Winter I also use the water from the de-humidifier I sometimes run in the conservatory.

The slender leaves are covered in a mass of very sticky globules which catch any unwary small flies which land on a leaf.

 

A fly's eye view



From experience  I can vouch that they are very sticky.

Sempervivum

Many years ago I had one small clump of Sempervivum growing in a pot.
Over the years it has appeared all over the place.
Presumably self sown seeds. Much of it is growing in the gravelled front garden.
It relieves the bareness of gravel.
Obviously it doesn't need much in the way of soil.
There is a membrane under the gravel.



Macro



A close crop of the above photo