Last August, my wife and daughter found a large Cecropia moth caterpillar crossing the road and brought it home. My daughter soon discovered that a parasitic fly had laid eggs on the caterpillar - once they hatch, the larvae eat the caterpillar from the inside out. She carefully removed the eggs and the caterpillar soon spun its cocoon. It overwintered in a jar in our garage and emerged 10 days ago. The feathery antennae indicate that it is a male. (Unmated females emit pheromones that males detect via sensors on their antennae.) I photographed the newly emerged moth in my lightbox using a print of OOF vegetation as the background. 1D IV, 100 mm macro, 1/160, f/16, ISO 100, 2 remotely fired 430 EX II flashes, hand held. All comments are welcome and appreciated.
Gorgeous, Steve. Love the story, too, particularly removing the eggs of the parasite successfully--very cool. The moth is in great condition, with rich colors. The background color complements the warm colors nicely. I wonder if a less bright background would work better. I have a window in the back wall of my lightbox, and the background is on a piece of cardboard that I can move closer or farther, lightening or darkening the background with the flash falloff.
Now thats a moth and a half !! Excellent. I like the suggestion re the moveable background.
Good story too. very much like or Emperor moth we have on the heathland here.
John
Thanks for the comments Ron and John. Here is a quick repost with a darker background for comparison. I used NIK Vivesa 2, selected the green background, darkened it 75% and reduced saturation 50%.
Gorgeous! Darkening the BG gives me the impression that the moth is also darker, but stacking them in PS, I see it isn't changed. For me, the beautiful moth stands out a little more in the OP. Maybe darken the BG only half that much??