Remembering PRESTAGS

Macro adventures on a ladder

There was an arachnid visitor to the extended web of the black house spider at my front door today (top of the wall where the eave joins). A large huntsman (I suspect a huntswoman actually) - sheltering from the heavy rain? Seemingly uninterested in the house spider further down the wall. (I might call her a pet, as I leave her big messy web in place above the door knowing she won't bother anyone unless they bother her).

A challenge for shooting, as she was behind the web on the wall - autofocus was almost certainly going to focus on the web in front not the spider.

I tried a couple of strategies - first a monopod with the foot wedged against the wall, and camera pointing up. I tried manual focus with live view (zoomed in), and there was sort of success but not stunning. (my eyes just couldn't pick focus or not through the 'normal size' optical viewfinder, especially as I was 'perched' and an odd angle).

Got out a tripod but realised that wasn't going to be high enough either. Then I thought about an approach I had contemplated for jumping spiders - using my travel tripod as a horizontal brace against the wall. This allowed be to have the camera positioned opposite the target rather than underneath. I imagine it looked weird to anyone driving along the street ...

So the set up was small 2 step ladder, tripod with all 3 legs against the wall with me pressing inwards to keep it stable. flash, manual exposure to get shutter speed up a bit, and live view with zoom in then manual focus to get focus on the spider not the web. Moderately pleased with the results. Had a go for the house spider but the web around her is too think and she is in a corner making bracing tricky - in the 'as shot' pic below you can see where she is though.

monopod shot - web in focus

As shot (size wise, minor process tweeks)

cropped image

The house spider hidden in her web. I was trying to focus manually but it was hopeless. She seems to have abandoned the big web further out from the door (her mother's from 3 or so years ago) and stays in the corner.

Peacock spider (Maratus pavonis ?), seen as a result of other opportunistic macro

iNaturalist suggests it is Maratus pavonis, the common peacock spider.

The lead up story - saw a little jumping spider on/under the handle on the shed door. Got the camera ...

here's a crop of one of those shots

as I was getting ready to take the gear back inside I quickly scanned the back wall of the house, and spied a little spider.

On a close look, it was a PEACOCK SPIDER !!!! It was such a thrill to see one in the flesh and to get to photograph him. A joy in the Creator's creation.

Here are few shots, all crops except the first one (for scale, beside the mortar line between bricks).

 

 

Bugs that impact my ability to code

This fellow dropped in on my work day last week. I took him outside as there was no food for him.

You can see that I do not use the Nazgul keyboard often.

First Jumper (photos) of the season

I had just got back from a ride and sitting on the front steps espied a little jumping spider on the wall of the house ... Quickly inside to collect camera, minitripod and flash.  These are all cropped a fair bit.

Here is the setup - the little tripod allows me to brace against the wall and avoid camera shake.

Accidental naturalist

Today I saw a little spider flitting very fast on the window & sill. I captured him (I think it was a male) with a glass. Very pretty markings. How to photograph? First I thought I would put some gladwrap over the glass and shoot through that. was worried that wouldn't be very stable. Then thought of a little shallow porcelain dish I could try - luckily virtually the same diameter as the glass so transfer wasn't a problem. Used a piece of hard plastic to 'seal' him in. Then had another thought - a clear lens filter sitting on the dish would not fall off and should not affect too much the optics.

Here is that set up:

then to attempting to photograph. lots and lots of shots. spider wouldn't sit still. getting light tricky (couldn't use flash as it would just reflect). Tried a couple of different tripod setups. Had the jar on the floor under the big lounge windows and was lying / crouching on the floor to get angles for shots. D7500 + 85 micro lens

This is actually one of the early shots. Google provided me with an identification this evening - Nyssus coloripes or orange legged swift spider. http://www.findaspider.org.au/find/spiders/509.htm  http://www.arachne.org.au/01_cms/details.asp?ID=1807  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyssus_coloripes

From all the observations I did notice something really neat - he was cleaning his legs, one at a time by running them past the mouth parts. Depth of field proved an insurmountable obstacle to get a nice shot of that but I saw it nevertheless.  I also didn't register for ages that he was missing one leg.

A gorgeous little spider. I subsequently released him under the bushes outside.

 

In between changing tripods (teeny for small) I also noticed that a male blackbird was sitting quite still outside the lounge window. Grabbed the D3300 and wacked on the 70-300 AF-P and tried to get some shots through the (not very clean) window. The bird was also sitting in a patch of shade so lighting was tricky and trying focus on a black bird. I also noticed he had a grub or worm in his beak. The shot below is a moderate crop with some post processing but I don't think focus was nailed and that can't be provided after the fact. Might be a function of the dirty window too.

I like blackbirds - they have a beautiful song, and flit quickly about through the spring and summer. The hen bird is a drabber brown colour. Although an immigrant species they haven't gone nuts like Indian mynas.

Trouble photographing black creatures - Willy Wagtail & a new jumping spider

Over the last few weeks one or more Willy Wagtails have been visiting the backyard. They flit about quickly and are elusive photographic subjects.

This morning there was one in the yard below the rear window. So rather than try to go out the door, and probably scare him off, I tried shooting through the glass.

There seem to be two challenges getting good focus - the all black around the eye, so little contrast for the AF system, and the rapid and almost never stationary movement of the bird.

but I got a couple of half-decent shots. shown as shot with a crop. Still some motion blur evident I think.

in this pic I think he has just done a little white poo !

The little jumping spider, with a similar body shape to a white tail. But the eye arrangement clearly shows it as a jumper. The lack of different colours made it hard to shoot this one, and he/she wasn't cooperating with being still either. These are all crops. The mortar line between the bricks gives scale.

 

 

Mystery spider

Thought he/she was a dead insect in a daddy longlegs web in the corner of the ceiling in the loo at Dad's house in Toowoomba.

Then I noticed it had moved position, and then noticed it move ever so slightly and indeed a spider - 8 legs visible. Probably body about 1.5 - 2 cm long so not very big.

Took some pics on the last day there, and upon internet searching it is a rufous net-casting spider - Deinopis subrufa.

These images are only of the top view of the spider so the characteristic 'dual headlights' big front eyes were not visible.

crop of shot above. the very front of the body you can see the 2 curves of the 2 front eyes.