SerendipityCopyrighted Digital Photograph

A surprise visitor appeared during the few seconds that I set up my camera to capture this beautiful flower.

Serendipity

I needed insect images as part of my Hawaiian project, but I struggled to find many to photograph, in the depths of what passes for Winter in the tropics. While this was a blessing in terms of avoiding insect bites in the rainforest and at the beach, it proved a very limiting factor in completing my image capture plans.

In pursuit of the flowering plants part of my list, I was wandering around in the tall grass on the slopes of Mount Kilauea and stopped to capture the delicate petals of this red flower. After making my adjustments, I composed the image in the viewfinder, focused on the plant, steadied the Monopod supporting the camera and lens, breathed out slowly and “clicked”.

During the the first image capture I did not realize that an insect had settled on the plant. Looking at the image on the camera’s viewing screen to check white Balance and enlarging the view to check for focus accuracy, I then saw the visitor and went back to shooting to try and capture it while it worked on this bloom. The subsequent images did not have the same flying impact as the unplanned one however, so I accepted the stroke of fate and present it here.

Speed is of the essence

The camera set-up described below prioritised a fast shutter speed over aperture, in order to avoid the blur that inevitably comes from photographing plants blowing in the breeze. Vibration reduction was switched off, since it does not have useful effect at shutter speeds over 1/500s and the good daylight generated a limited, but acceptable aperture of 6.3.

That said, when a flying insect buzzes into view, the choice of faster speed provides a better chance of capturing its body movement and wingbeats. A serendipitous technical benefit!

Settings

Camera: Nikon D800

Lens: VR 70-200mm zoom f/2.8G

Focal Length: 155 mm

Vibration reduction: Off

Focus Mode: AF-S

Autofocus Area Mode: Single

Aperture: f/6.3

Shutter Speed: 1/800s

Exposure Mode: Shutter Priority

Exposure Compensation : 0

Metering: Matrix

ISO Sensitivity: 640

Mounted on Monopod

This was photographed during my “Genesis” project, as part of the plant and insect depictions and will be posted to the website in due course, once the project is complete.

Copyright Paul Grayson 2015