Owl Butterfly

[Chris J]

From the Butterfly Farm at Stratford. The name comes from the "owl-eye" markings on the wings.

The whole thing, wings closed -



- and enjoying some pineapple juice -



- and then going in close on one of the "owl eyes" -



Surprisingly, it has rather nice blue wings on top when they are unfolded.

All 50D + EF100mm Macro, with 580EXmk11 off-camera.

Well worth a visit, but be prepared for 30mins "de-misting" time unless you have some way of taking your gear in hot!

Cheers, Chris.

[Jedicolin]

Re: Owl Butterfly

Great photos Chris, I really like the last one.

I went to the local butteryfly farm back in the summer and it took ages for my lens to de-mist!

Colin

[Hereford_EOS2]

Re: Owl Butterfly

Nice photos Chris, I prefer #1.
I visited this butterfly house at Stratford 2 years ago, a really good place.

[Stan]

Re: Owl Butterfly

These are lovely butterflies but you have picked a bit of a ragged specimen to shoot
I have found flash the way to go in butterfly houses, I like the first shot but the others are a bit bright - probably needed to turn the flash power down a little
Stan

[Stan]

Re: Owl Butterfly

These are lovely butterflies but you have picked a bit of a ragged specimen to shoot

[Chris J]

Re: Owl Butterfly

Thanks for the comments.
You are right, Stan, this one does have rather tatty wingtips but I liked the background which it blended in to with its folded wings.
Likewise use flash (but will try going there on a sunny day sometime - this was a dull day) but find I need to do a lot of referring to histograms and the rear screen to get the exposure right. Might have overdone it a bit on the last two. Used partial metering for most of these - evaluative can sometimes cause difficulties with distant, dull backgrounds and spot metering seems a bit extreme - what metering mode would you use?
And if in doubt is it better to under-expose a bit and then brighten through DPP or PS rather than risk over-exposure where burnt-out bits are beyond saving?
Cheers, Chris.

[Stan]

Re: Owl Butterfly

Hi Chris

The last time I went to a butterfly house I used my ring flash (just the cheap Marumi one ) on a tamron 90 macro, used manual mode, I think 1/200, f 8, ISO 400, which on its own meant a very underexposed image leaving the flash to do the work - set again i think to about -1 fev. The result was perfectly exposed butterflies against dark backgrounds

Stan