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Flowering gum and bee macros

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Lance B

Lance B

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I planted an orange flowering gum in our garden last year and it has now flowered for the first time. I decided to take a few macros this afternoon as there were some bees getting some pollen and thought they would make good subject matter for the flowers. It was a difficult task as there was a breeze blowing and the bees don't like to sit still for even a split second. Flash was the only way to even attempt to freeze action. I certainly know what they mean by "busy as a bee"!!.

6 x large 1000 x 667 images in reply

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Lance B

http://www.pbase.com/lance_b
GMT +10hours

 
All with the K10D and DFA100mm f2.8 macro with AF540FGZ as a control flash on camera and a hand held AF360FGZ as a slave fill flash.





This is a crop of the above image:









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Lance B

http://www.pbase.com/lance_b
GMT +10hours

 
Merry Christmas Lance! (well "day after Christmas - HA!)

These are quite lovely. I especially like #3 and 4. They just pop off the screen!

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Tracy
7:45 AM
 


Hi,

Great pictures!

Which setting (bright/natural) and sharpness level did you use on these images, or - if you were shooting RAW images - how did you convert them to JPEGs?
 
Nice shots Lance. Love that flower....beautiful color and interesting petals. I'll have to get the spouse to plant some of those in her garden this summer (if they grow in this region).
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PRH

 
Those are brilliant Lance. The season has inspired you!
Perhaps you'll share your secret of making the K10D produce these
results without all the current issues?

Cheers

Wes
 
Great shots, I particularly like the last one. Nice detail.

K10D issues? I've had mine for a week, and I haven't got any issues except amazement at what it can do. This is a wonderful piece of equipment.
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'This is more serious than I thought.....but it is still fun!
http://www.pbase.com/rupertdog Take a look- It's Free!
 
Thats some great detail and color. Looks like the 100mm Macro is a very nice lens indeed - I will probably get one in the future sometime - Id rather have the 100mm Macro over the 50mm for the extra range. Would the builtin flash not suffice for these pics as a fill flash or did having an external one make a real difference? I dont really like flash photography but the flash comes in handy for fill light for shots like these though I cant justify spending about $350 or so on a flash as I wont make much use of it - is the 360 a good one too - that is about $200 or you think the on-board is good enough for my intended use which would be similar to this with it being used as a fill light most of the time and maybe for some nightime groupshots of people though I find the on-board is usually enough for that especially at ISO400 or so where it has pretty decent reach.

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Sinan

 
Those are really beautiful, Lance. Seems the 'model' bee stayed there long enough for you to play w/ your flash setup ;) All are very nice indeed.

I tried w/ macros the day before Christmas when we were in the park, but failed to even get one decent macor shot :(

Thanks for sharing and happy holidays (I'm still on leave ;) !
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Frank
GMT+8hours

 
Lance,

very fine images!

We have numerous species of eucalyptus here in s. california. I'm particularly fond of the rather wonderful scent from the lemon eucalyptus tree.

thanks for sharing.

kind regards,

Nic
 
Hi Lance:

Nice shots. I have a K10 on order and am wondering how the K10 works for macros. Since flash was used, it looks like you didn't have SR on? Since the SR is supposed to work better for far away subjects, I am wondering how it does for macros.

Dale
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http://www.pbase.com/abundant108
 
dLight said:


Hi,

Great pictures!

Which setting (bright/natural) and sharpness level did you use on
these images, or - if you were shooting RAW images - how did you
convert them to JPEGs?
Click to expand...
Hi dLight,

I shot in RAW and used Silkypix to do adjustments to the RAW pic. Did a contrast curve, WB adjust and then convert them to 16bit TIFF. I then opened in Photoshop CS, did a crop to 1000 x 669 for web size and final sharpening, then jpeg for web view.

--
Lance B

http://www.pbase.com/lance_b
GMT +10hours

 
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