First impressions of 5DSr Springtail Hunt 26th december 2015

I bought myself a new camera for x-mass , a 50 mega pixel monster, the canon 5Dsr . It is in fact a last x mass pressie from my Mum who passed away in April , she would approve i think :)  .

     Its boxing day and my first chance to give it a good test ,i cant go out to shoot landscapes today due to a party this afternoon/evening and being middle of winter there are not many bugs out , But Springtails can always be found if i am lucky, being so tiny, usually under 4 mm in length and quite often under 1 mm !
    After a quick hunt in the garden i have found a few on the wooden table sides of the barbecue , a couple of tiny Globular springtails and a couple of the common cylindrical ones and loads on the window sill of the conservatory

Putting the mpe-65 macro lens on and shooting at its maximum x5 magnification , its quite difficult to actually find these tiny bugs in the viewfinder!     This camera has a larger viewfinder compared to my 5d mk2 and its quite a bit clearer making manual focusing easier :)

          This one is a single frame, shot on window sill at f7.1 with diffused off camera 430ex flash

                                                                Entomobrya intermedia

The flash fall off seems less than on the old camera  , with more light reaching the background which is making exposure a little easier , i am using +3/4 FEC shooting against the white background for these.      The detail is very impressive on these huge files from what i have seen so far. the RAW files are averaging 53 mb each!

Now to the wooden side panels on the barbecue to see if i can shoot one of the Globular Springtails i found earlier.

Found one :)   i have to shoot level with the wood surface to get within an inch of the subject at maximum magnification, This way i can get a good side on composition. The subject needs to be within 2 cm of the wood edge to be in focus.  This one is so tiny !  well under 1 mm in length.  at this magnification approximately 4mm fills frame width of full frame sensor.


    This image is Uncropped .  the background Bokeh is beautifully smooth from this new sensor , especially considering i am shooting with flash :)

              This species is Katiannidae Gen1 nov    Here is a crop from above image.   Detail is very impressive in this big crop ,   this is 5 frames focus stacked to increase the very limited depth of field at these high magnifications.

                                       Another image of same individual, single frame

After a few more shoots with the springtails , i truly love this new camera for macro with flash,  seems more forgiving when shooting macro  compared to older 5d mk2.  Need to find some larger subjects now .

       This is the quality i am now getting after a few practice shoots , cant wait to find some larger subjects! as at these high magnifications there is always greater diffraction softening compared to shooting at say 1-3 x magnification.   this was shot at f6.3  5 frames focus stacked,slight crop

Conclusions so far , in a different league to my 5d mk2!     Everything so far is better apart from a rubber thumb grip that is too proud for my small hands when supporting the heavy weight of mpe at full extension , getting a sore thumb   lol
Picture wise its everything it is supposed to be , amazing detail, smooth oof areas , shooting with flash at iso100 i cant comment so far on its high iso performance which is supposed to be not so good, but i rarely shoot above iso 400 anyhow so that wont be a problem .

           Tomorrow we are going to Snowdonia so will see how it fares on landscapes :)

Garden Bug Hunt 9th March 2015

Time for a bit of macro i think , not done nearly enough for ages, so while it is dry i will dust off the macro gear and get the mpe-65 out to find some tiny Springtails :)

Moving pots on the patio i have found loads of them , but they are so fast I'm struggling to find any that will stay still long enough to find in the viewfinder lol     at x5 magnification with mpe focal distance is under 2 inch, and with the largest of these springtails at about 3mm in length is proving difficult, especially as i am out of practise!!!!!!!! 


                      Eventually i have found one on a algae covered stone ,  Isotomurus maculatus :)

                            f7.1  full diffused flash iso100   x 5 magnification and cropped a touch.

 On a piece of rotten wood i have been examining i have noticed a few of these, Tomocerus minor
the flash shows of its colours :)

At last i have found a Globular Springtail , a small one under 2mm in length  Dicyrtomina saundersi

                        this image is again at x5 magnification and cropped a bit for composition.

                                    Big crop from similarly composed frame as above , they are Tiny!
           

 I have not found any more that will stay still long enough , so a Woodlouse makes a good portrait :D

                                    A Green lacewing at x5 magnification on a piece of kitchen towel.

Springtail Madness jan 22nd

On Sunday i had another go at finding springtails in the garden,  i have a dead cordalyne and the bark is falling off , which makes a good hiding place for springtails :)
They like the damp conditions under the bark, so i just place a piece on the stone patio steps and wait for a few to "jump" off, then i can shoot them as they walk along the edge of the step!

The first one i found was the common species   Dicyrtomina saundersi ,a largish species up to about 3mm in length.  Shot with canon 5d2 and mpe at x5 mag , and cropped a bit!

After shooting this one, before it jumped somewhere!  LOL  i suddenly noticed a much smaller one, i initially thought it was just a smaller D saundersi  but when viewed through the mpe it appeared to have different coloured eyes!      i have since found out it is a recently found species in the uk , originating from New Zealand!   Calvatomina nr superba  ,  quite a small species , about 1.5 mm this individual specimen.

Note the black eye spots in the centre of a coloured eye patch!  again shot with mpe at x5 mag on full frame 5d2.

The next one i found was a quite large D Saundersi, but was tucked into a piece of wood bark, so this is the best angle i could get!

Later in the afternoon i went out to find some more, and found a new species that i haven't found in the garden before,  D minuta.  and this was a very small young one that apparently had just shed its skin!

Shot with 5d2 mpe @ x5 mag  as shot!  note the old skin shed!

it was so small i had to go and get my 450d crop sensor body to shoot with!

here is same springtail shot with 450d crop sensor @x5 mag  as shot, showing difference between full frame and crop sensor in magnification!!!!!!!!

and a cropped shot from the above image,  isn't it CUTE!   Haha

I then managed to find a quite large D saundersi , about 2mm  :),  it was shot as it walked along the top edge of stone step, so i could get a low shooting angle.  5d2, mpe @x5 mag  and cropped!

all shot with canon 5d2,450d and mpe-65 at x5 mag.

Jan 8th Alian Blob and springtails at whixall moss

I travelled to whixall moss in Shropshire this morning just to get out shooting, the forecast looked ok!

The plan was to look for more springtails , hopefully a few different species , as i have only been shooting globulars recently.

It was quite overcast when i arrived, but still warmish and still.  almost straight away i found some springys on the wooden fence posts :)
they are very small, about 2  mm in length , shot at x5 mag with canon mpe-65 and cropped!

                                               And another one, not sure if different species.

  I then found a Ant-mimic spider,  not a good shot ,but i have only ever seen one before !    this one did not want to be shot so this is the only shot i got!!!!!

i then found "THE BLOB"   it is in fact a Hoverfly larvae , not seen one before but they have very interesting skin textures!   it was about 10mm in length.

                                                           amazing translucent skin!!!!

A  few more springtail shots :)

Then another spider, a male with big boxing gloves !   Haha

Then the rain came!!!!   i got soaked!! and that was the end of the shoot:(

all images canon 5d2, mpe-65

New year Springtails

My first macro shots of 2012!

went into the garden to find a few globular springtails, tiny little bugs approx 1-2 mm in size.
all were shot at the mpe-65 maximum magnification of x5 .using 5d2   full frame camera does have its disadvantages, losing quite a bit of magnification compared to crop sensor body's!

The first springtails i found were a globular species Dicyrtomina minuta , i had not noticed this species in the garden before.   they are Soooo  Cute :)  probably just under 1mm in length!

shot at f7  , i had inadvertently left camera in av mode, and shot at 1/60th shutterspeed full flash!   but came out superbly well!

Most of these shots are 2 frame focus stacks, where multiple frames each with a slightly different focal point are merged to increase depth of field!  which at this magnification is a lot less than 1mm!

I found these tiny springtails under a piece of fallen tree bark that was in  the garden,  another species of globular springtail, Dicyrtomina saundersi was also present, i think this is one of the commonest species!  they do vary in colour quite a lot, but always have nice pattering on the body.  

this one was a bit bigger at approx 1.5 mm :)

shot in manual mode, full flash, f6.3,  1/200th

A couple days later , after heavy rain , shot  another one , a paler individual!  i have been shooting them on the back steps, the stone is nice natural setting!

This is probably my best ever globular image!  ever!

and another shot of it  running along the edge of the step!  Lol

and then i found a casualty,  a problem with being so tiny, i trod on one!   OOPS !

Im Sorry!

another one shot on wet bark, very difficult to get good exposure, had to combine 2 exposures of the same frame altered in RAW to get this shot looking ok!

all images shot with canon 5d2 and mpe-65 at maximum magnification.