Definitely not a bird, but obviously flys,
I used a Phototrap (phototrap.com) with Bill Forbes direction to get many of these in a couple evenings. I'm trying to make sure the flower is not too bright that it is distracting, wondering if I sure make a mask and just reduce the sat or vibrance on the the flower
Canon 7D, Canon 100 marco 2.8 L, ISO 320 (should have gone lower) since I used the flash to determine shutter speed, 2 were set at 1/16 power. Loved doing this as this is an endangered species and I was able to bring some of my photography interested wildlife bio students with me.
Comments always appreciated.
Last edited by Stan Cunningham; 09-06-2010 at 11:29 PM.
More than nicely done Stan! What a treat to see a bat on BPN! Beautiful wing angle, and head angle for that matter. What species please? I'll definitely look up Phototrap.
I like the modelled lighting although the shadow of the left arm is a bit harsh. I agree with your own critique that a toning down of the flower may work. I would consider two things to improve the image- run another round of sharpening- I did this and it worked great, and consider a different crop to remove some of the black from the LHS of the image. Of these, I think the sharpening is most important and really makes the image jump off the screen.
Agree with John's critique but I also think this as a stand alone image without the flower would be just as strong. It's about angles here and the intensity of those angles that makes this image really special for me. I'd love to see him get all the focus with no distractions.
Great capture and agree to some more sharpening and toning down the flower. Clone it out if you want to, but the flower does give me some idea about the size of the bat and its environment.
Must be fun to use phototrap. Kind of like the cops catching the speeders on the streets ?:D
Thank you all for your kind comments. I'll try another round of sharpening John, the only sharpening I've done is in Lightroom so far. The species is the Lesser Long nosed bat, Leptonycteris yerbabuenae, how's that for a mouthful. They've been listed as endangered for about 6 - 8 years but seem to be holding their own, and quite common this time of year at feeders on the AZ Mexico border before they migrate south for the winter. Nectar feeders so have to go south.
Julie, although I appreciate the comment I'll probably keep the Agave flower since it tells the story of that's what the bat is coming to for dinner. I'm afraid that this biologist can never get biology out of my system, and thanks again for the compliment.
Desmond, I love Phototrap, my next post will be a black chinned and a broad billed hummingbirds I used it for to photograph. Set it up, walk away and take a nap since I was up all night and come back and see if Santa brought me some nice birds to my camera. It's the only way I'll get the carnivore shots I want here in AZ so I'm having a blast with it.
Stan- LR sharpening isprobably quite similar or the same as Photoshop's (don't use LR myself) so maybe just a bit more aggresive sharpening was needed. Here's what a fairly subtle (Photoshop Smart sharpen, 100%, 0.3) round of extra sharpening on top of what you did can do. Better results would be obtained by you- I sharpened the compressed jpeg version you posted which would tend to accentuate any jpeg anolamies as well.
Thanks John, I just did that this morning before I am off to work. Looks great, unfortunately I'm a real neophyte when it comes to photoshop so my learning curve is very high. I have Art's book and am slowly working through it but the folks on this site are a HUGE help.
Some photos from night work
