Sunday, July 12, 2009

My first tryst with Macro photography

In all my recent nature-watching trips, I've been ardently locating butterflies, dragonflies and a wide array of insects. Decided it was time to try out some macro photography. I borrowed a Tamron 90mm macro lens from my friend and set off to Madiwala Lake on Friday.

One of the first obstacles to photographing insects is...it's hard to find one that sits still! And, as I discovered, the slightest movement is enough to lose focus.

And then I found this pair of Gram Blues that didn't mind the attention. They were busy with their job for over an hour giving me ample opportunity to try out different aspects of macro photography. Did you know that the butterfly family Lycaenidae (which includes Blues and the colorful Pierrots) constitutes 40% of all butterfly species?

My first "true" macro shot - Gram Blues Mating

That was my first Macro photograph!

Encouraged by the result, I tried it out on Saturday morning again. And this was my second shot, this time of a Lesser Grass Blue.

Lesser Grass Blue

Learnings so far:
1) Use Manual Focus. Autofocus doesn't seem to be of much use, except for initial
"rough" focusing.
2) A Flash is good to have, especially because you'd be shooting with very small aperture.
3) Let the wind blow over!

7 comments:

molarbear's posts said...

Great work Shreeram...and thanks for sharing the tips, too!

deponti-on-LJ

ಯತೀಶ್ said...

Nice one to start with.. keep going.!

Roma said...

very crystal clear snaps. Too good for a first shot!

Chandrakant said...

Can't believe this is your first attempt at Macro Photography :-0
Great Job!!!
Keep sharing your learnings with us.

Sandeep said...

nice work man.. good shot of Gram Blues.

starshade said...

wow! these r really nicely done

Shreeram M V said...

Thanks everyone :)