The Nature, Wildlife and Pet Photography Forum - Fine Art Landscape Photography

Blue Dasher

Blue Dasher - 07/15/07 04:07 AM

Finally tossed my 300D and was sitting around waiting for birds with my new 30D at my favourite swamp when I decided to see how well my 100-400 zoom(non macro) would handle the local dragonflies.
This is a Blue Dasher which is a type of Skimmer here in the South.(Pachydiplax longipennis for the purists)

Posted By: James Morrissey

Re: Blue Dasher - 07/16/07 03:35 AM

Hey Joe,

Awesome shots - really quite nice. I don't know how you guys get these great macro softs of the dragon flies. I cannot seem to get within 5 feet of them before they bolt.

James

Posted By: Sarah

Re: Blue Dasher - 07/18/07 04:29 PM

Gorgeous shot

Posted By: glamson

Re: Blue Dasher - 07/18/07 06:46 PM

Quote:

Finally tossed my 300D and was sitting around waiting for birds with my new 30D at my favourite swamp when I decided to see how well my 100-400 zoom(non macro) would handle the local dragonflies.
This is a Blue Dasher which is a type of Skimmer here in the South.(Pachydiplax longipennis for the purists)

Joe,

Looks like it does pretty well. Couple of questions.

Are these cropped and if so, how much?

I was also wondering what in your workflow stips out the EXIF info from your images. I'm always curious about settings and I've noticed that all your images show no EXIF info with the Opanda viewer.

Great shots.

George

Posted By: Joe Piotrowski

Re: Blue Dasher - 07/19/07 11:52 AM

George,

About 50 percent of the originals were cropped. I couldn't fill the frame with the bug but did get as close as my focus would allow.
Here's my workflow:
I shoot only in Raw. I import all my photos via card reader into Lightroom which I use primarily for organizing. In Lightroom my photos are organized by location and Date shot. I use the loop view with magnifying to pick out those photos I think are worth a second look by marking them with 4 stars. Then I filter the directory to only look at 4 star photos. Out of them I pick out a few photos which I then import a copy into Photoshop CS2(CS3 is on order). In photoshop I do mostly cropping,curves,Unsharp mask-which I like better than smart mask, and printing on my Epson 2400.
I use Moab paper which I have IC profiles for my printer and my monitor is calibrated.
To get a photo ready for the web I need to "dumb" it down. I convert it to 8 bit, then convert from native .psd format to sRGB. I then use Image Ready(which in PS is linked via the Save image for Web tab) and reduce the size to 25-30 percent. Then I save it and import it into my photosharing site.Image Ready strips out the EXIF data.

For these photos the data are:
Canon 30D
Iso 500 400mm 1/250sec f/6.7 no flash
Iso 500 560mm 1/180sec f/11 no flash
Here's one of them uncropped

Because of the intense shaddows I needed to adjust the mid and lower parts of the curve quite a bit.

Posted By: glamson

Re: Blue Dasher - 07/20/07 05:05 PM

Quote:

George,

About 50 percent of the originals were cropped. I couldn't fill the frame with the bug but did get as close as my focus would allow.
Here's my workflow:
I shoot only in Raw. I import all my photos via card reader into Lightroom which I use primarily for organizing. In Lightroom my photos are organized by location and Date shot. I use the loop view with magnifying to pick out those photos I think are worth a second look by marking them with 4 stars. Then I filter the directory to only look at 4 star photos. Out of them I pick out a few photos which I then import a copy into Photoshop CS2(CS3 is on order). In photoshop I do mostly cropping,curves,Unsharp mask-which I like better than smart mask, and printing on my Epson 2400.
I use Moab paper which I have IC profiles for my printer and my monitor is calibrated.
To get a photo ready for the web I need to "dumb" it down. I convert it to 8 bit, then convert from native .psd format to sRGB. I then use Image Ready(which in PS is linked via the Save image for Web tab) and reduce the size to 25-30 percent. Then I save it and import it into my photosharing site.Image Ready strips out the EXIF data.

Joe,

Thanks for the info. It's a shame that ImageReady strips the EXIF. I spent about 5 min with PS trying to find a way to save the EXIF but it looks like Adobe doesn't think the EXIF needs to be saved for the web. What were they thinking?

Thanks again and great images.

George