Yet-to-be Identified Fly

[acbaker]

I think it is Mark Twain who is credited with saying, "The good Lord never made a mistake, but with the fly he came close." Personally, I find flies to be interesting, but exceedingly difficult to photograph "in the wild." They just never stay put for very long.

The rig I use for butterflies works also for flies when the lens is focused closer, and it seems that whenever the action on butterflies reaches a lull, there are the flies. This image along with a couple of others captured last year remain unidentified. I wonder if anything comes to mind for you? (I'll post the other two in separate threads.)

This and the other two are "grab" shots, only one angle and no follow-up shots; so if there is not enough here to go on, I'll certainly understand.

TIA,
ACB

[Eric]

AC:

"Muscoid" flies of several families all look basically alike, and I don't have time right now to decipher which one this represents. Sorry.

Eric

[acbaker]

Understand, Eric... no problem. I'll take the clue "muscoid" and pursue that a bit.

ACB

[Mandy]

Excellent image! I'm curious what you meant about the butterfly rig... is that a certain type of camera you use, or do you have a container you place over them or something? I know you have all sorts of tricks/tips up your sleeve, so would love to learn from them as they come up!

[acbaker]

Hi, Mandy...

When I get my equipment back from of its current "rig" (I'm taking pictures of baby Robins in the nest using that camera in a remote flash and trigger setup... you may have seen them on Facebook) I'll rig it for butterflies and post a shot of the setup on here. It's pretty simple and could readily be adapted to other equipment I'm sure.

[Mandy]

Okay, sounds great, thanks Arch! ...and I haven't been on facebook for a few weeks, but I logged in just now to check out the birdie pics. Wow!! Amazing shots of something seldom seen by human eyes! Love it!

[acbaker]

Had to bring in the "bird camera" and flash for fresh batteries, so I switched over to the "butterfly rig" briefly for a couple of shots of the setup. What makes a difference in this setup is NOT the camera and lens, what you are using already will do just fine. It's the flash and its diffuser moved off camera and relatively close to the subject that sets pictures apart (IMO).

The flash should be strong enough to allow the use of smaller apertures, f/11-22. Auto exposure is nice, but once you "calibrate" for the fixed flash distance and the aperture you're using, it's all "manual" from there. The lens I use focuses for maximum magnification at about 8 in. from the front lens element. I configured the bracket to accommodate that distance and a ~45 deg. angle to the subject. The diffuser is home made (as you can tell), and works on the principle that the larger the light source in relation to the subject, the softer the shadows. It sometimes helps to "bounce" a little fill light from the opposite side using a piece of white poster board or foam-core. (I carry clothespins for clipping the fill cards to plant stems or leaves.)

You can get much the same effect in a stationary, "posed" situation by just hanging a piece of typing paper a few inches in front of the flash unit. Making my own diffuser to slide over the front of the flash offered the option of portability as well as repeatability of results. It wound up costing me almost $3 because of the velcro material and the minimum amount of white muslin at a hobby store. I've also used the same setup without the jointed bracket, just hand-holding the flash. It's way quicker and more consistent with the bracket since the only way to focus at those magnifications is by moving the whole rig in and out relative to the subject.

It may not be very elegant, but it sure is less expensive than ring flash or twin-strobe "macro" setups! I think it works fine.

Hope that gives you some ideas.

CUL,
ACB

[Mandy]

Thanks, Arch! Now that is cool! It definitely does give me some ideas. I'm going to start looking for an external flash for my camera then... light is almost always my biggest issue to work through when taking pictures.