First Dragon Fly I've ever seen in my garden... Migrant Hawker I believe.
IPClark
Registered Users Posts: 2,355 Major grins
Just got back from a week in Disneyland Paris, a quick peruse of the garden revealed a nice surprise.
I've never been fortunate enough to see a Dragon Fly in my garden. Either because there has never been any or just that I've missed them (suspect the former). Anyway, on a quick perusal in the garden today I spotted this beauty on one of our conifers. A quick browse of UK Dragonflies shows it to be a Migrant Hawker. This one was around 5-6cm in length.
The first shot in the Conifer. Not brilliant. I should have opened up the aperture to reduce DoF in the BG but I was more concerned about getting at least one shot in case it flew off.
A little closer
After the second shot, it flew off but then returned a few seconds later. This time with a droplet on its eye.
Two similar images, the second of these two is not a crop but just a bit closer to the Dragon to try and get the water droplet more defined.
Of course we now move onto the obligatory finger shots, not before it had flown away a further 2 times as far as two gardens away before coming back hence the resulting smaller droplets on the eye.
The portrait shot. I would have preferred more DoF but hand holding a 7D with flash and diffuser on with one hand and trying to get a sharp shot is not the easiest thing to do.
Finally, the top side shot. I would have loved to have got the whole dragon in to show all 4 wings but I needed to hold the camera or my finger at a further distance and open up the aperture to avoid a cluttered BG (not easy when holding the camera in your only free hand) however it was getting a bit more active at this point and looking to head off...which it did straight after this shot. Looks like it had a few water droplets on the wings too.
I've never been fortunate enough to see a Dragon Fly in my garden. Either because there has never been any or just that I've missed them (suspect the former). Anyway, on a quick perusal in the garden today I spotted this beauty on one of our conifers. A quick browse of UK Dragonflies shows it to be a Migrant Hawker. This one was around 5-6cm in length.
The first shot in the Conifer. Not brilliant. I should have opened up the aperture to reduce DoF in the BG but I was more concerned about getting at least one shot in case it flew off.
A little closer
After the second shot, it flew off but then returned a few seconds later. This time with a droplet on its eye.
Two similar images, the second of these two is not a crop but just a bit closer to the Dragon to try and get the water droplet more defined.
Of course we now move onto the obligatory finger shots, not before it had flown away a further 2 times as far as two gardens away before coming back hence the resulting smaller droplets on the eye.
The portrait shot. I would have preferred more DoF but hand holding a 7D with flash and diffuser on with one hand and trying to get a sharp shot is not the easiest thing to do.
Finally, the top side shot. I would have loved to have got the whole dragon in to show all 4 wings but I needed to hold the camera or my finger at a further distance and open up the aperture to avoid a cluttered BG (not easy when holding the camera in your only free hand) however it was getting a bit more active at this point and looking to head off...which it did straight after this shot. Looks like it had a few water droplets on the wings too.
0
Comments
Brian V.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lordv/
http://www.lordv.smugmug.com/
I'm rather pleased with these ones hehe
My Smugmug gallery