A new year for an old dog with new tricks
Dec 2, 2020 22:57:08 #
Last years' pictures are all posted, finally, and so here begins a new line-up of pictures that were taken during this previous season. Included are some new methods in post-processing (new methods for me, anyway).
Early in the season, the critters of course start to come out. First up is a centipede. I never knew what these particular centipedes were called, but BugGuide names them ‘stone centipedes’. A bit of inquiry gives the likely ID as Lithobius forficatus.
Stone centipede by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
Next is one of at least a hundred digger bees (Anthophora sp.) that were swarming around the parking lot in the Magic Field early last April like I had never seen before. The ground was pock-marked with hundreds of exit holes (so that’s what those holes were for!), and the bees were especially dense over a few dead logs. I suppose those were males that had sensed females that were trying to emerge.
Digger bee by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
Several pictures were taken of the bees, but I was so rusty at photography after the long winter that none of them came out – all were extremely over-exposed, so I tried to correct them with the usual tricks that I apply to large jpegs, but it was not working well. Funny, but I shoot in Raw but never really take advantage of it. So I’ve been teaching myself how to use Raw Therapee, which is free raw image processing software, with the aim in seeing what it could do with the original camera Raw pictures. Raw Therapee is very powerful, but also very cryptic. Fortunately, there are scads of tutorials on YouTube, and they helped immensely in the miraculous resurrection of the bee pictures. But another problem was that the corrections for the bees meant that the color of the background did not come out right. How to fix that? So I taught myself how to do some basic layer masking, where one picture was corrected for the bee, and another picture was corrected for the background. These were put into layers (in Gimp), and I used a layer mask to paint the layers together. This is as nothing to a “real” photographer. A trifle. But I was all like: 😳.
Another early season arrival to the Magic Field are the appropriately named festive tiger beetles (Cicindella scutellaris). These spectacular but predatory beetles become common out on the sunny trails, where they hunt for small insects and for mates. Anyone trying to photograph tiger beetles will know that they can be a challenge, as they are always alert and fast. But they also have very short memories, so if you park yourself where they patrol they soon forget all about you and come wandering back. Festives are even a little friendly, so more than once I’ve had one crawl right onto my hand.
Here I attempted to do some hand-held focus stacking of the beetles. Most were done with the help of the Helicon Fb tube, shooting in burst mode, but I was also able to do some of the focus bracketing without the tube by just scooching forward a tiny bit for each picture. I was rather surprised the beetles had cooperated!
Some are mostly green:
Festive tiger beetle by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
But most are mostly purple.
Festive tiger beetle by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
Festive tiger beetles by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
Festive tiger beetle by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
Having learned a few tricks from the digger bee experience, the stacks were further processed from different pictures to bring up the beetle 'undercarriage' colors a little, while also controlling the colors and tone of the rest of the scene in another picture. These were then combined by layer masking.
Layer masking … who knew??
Early in the season, the critters of course start to come out. First up is a centipede. I never knew what these particular centipedes were called, but BugGuide names them ‘stone centipedes’. A bit of inquiry gives the likely ID as Lithobius forficatus.
Stone centipede by Mark Sturtevant, on FlickrNext is one of at least a hundred digger bees (Anthophora sp.) that were swarming around the parking lot in the Magic Field early last April like I had never seen before. The ground was pock-marked with hundreds of exit holes (so that’s what those holes were for!), and the bees were especially dense over a few dead logs. I suppose those were males that had sensed females that were trying to emerge.
Digger bee by Mark Sturtevant, on FlickrSeveral pictures were taken of the bees, but I was so rusty at photography after the long winter that none of them came out – all were extremely over-exposed, so I tried to correct them with the usual tricks that I apply to large jpegs, but it was not working well. Funny, but I shoot in Raw but never really take advantage of it. So I’ve been teaching myself how to use Raw Therapee, which is free raw image processing software, with the aim in seeing what it could do with the original camera Raw pictures. Raw Therapee is very powerful, but also very cryptic. Fortunately, there are scads of tutorials on YouTube, and they helped immensely in the miraculous resurrection of the bee pictures. But another problem was that the corrections for the bees meant that the color of the background did not come out right. How to fix that? So I taught myself how to do some basic layer masking, where one picture was corrected for the bee, and another picture was corrected for the background. These were put into layers (in Gimp), and I used a layer mask to paint the layers together. This is as nothing to a “real” photographer. A trifle. But I was all like: 😳.
Another early season arrival to the Magic Field are the appropriately named festive tiger beetles (Cicindella scutellaris). These spectacular but predatory beetles become common out on the sunny trails, where they hunt for small insects and for mates. Anyone trying to photograph tiger beetles will know that they can be a challenge, as they are always alert and fast. But they also have very short memories, so if you park yourself where they patrol they soon forget all about you and come wandering back. Festives are even a little friendly, so more than once I’ve had one crawl right onto my hand.
Here I attempted to do some hand-held focus stacking of the beetles. Most were done with the help of the Helicon Fb tube, shooting in burst mode, but I was also able to do some of the focus bracketing without the tube by just scooching forward a tiny bit for each picture. I was rather surprised the beetles had cooperated!
Some are mostly green:
Festive tiger beetle by Mark Sturtevant, on FlickrBut most are mostly purple.
Festive tiger beetle by Mark Sturtevant, on FlickrFestive tiger beetles by Mark Sturtevant, on FlickrFestive tiger beetle by Mark Sturtevant, on FlickrHaving learned a few tricks from the digger bee experience, the stacks were further processed from different pictures to bring up the beetle 'undercarriage' colors a little, while also controlling the colors and tone of the rest of the scene in another picture. These were then combined by layer masking.
Layer masking … who knew??
Dec 2, 2020 23:03:37 #
Great photos with excellent detail. Please stay safe and Mele Kalikimaka.
Dec 3, 2020 07:05:14 #
Dec 3, 2020 07:14:57 #
Dec 3, 2020 09:09:51 #
Dec 3, 2020 10:04:16 #
A very exciting start to your new season from the Magic Field and beyond. Well done, lovely clarity.
Dec 3, 2020 10:10:07 #
Dec 3, 2020 11:00:54 #
Mark, and excellent and professionally taken series along with an informative narrative. I always learn something from each of your posts.
Dec 3, 2020 11:14:07 #
tinusbum wrote:
good shots Mark! Layer masking?
Thank you, everybody.
Layer masking is a common post-processing trick. It allows one to have great power in controlling the color or brightness or other effects in parts of a picture without effecting other parts of the picture. Here is a very quick tutorial on a simple layer mask effect for Gimp: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPMmfUNmsJM but you can do the same in Photoshop. There is a lot more that is possible with layer masking.
For some reason I could never get my head around it. But suddenly, it all 'clicked'.
Dec 3, 2020 12:51:04 #
Dec 3, 2020 13:29:23 #
Dec 3, 2020 14:52:21 #
Dec 4, 2020 22:17:33 #
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