Mid November wasps

[GardenersHelper]

These were captured this afternoon in our garden with a Raynox 150 on my FZ330 bridge camera with KX800 twin flash, using ISO 100 at 1/1600 sec and f/8, which is equivalent to f/45 on a full frame camera in terms of depth of field and loss of sharpness/detail from diffraction.

The raw files were processed in DXO Optics Pro 11 to produce DNG files which were processed in Silkypix Developer 7 Pro to produce TIFF files which were processed in Lightroom 6 to produce 1300 pixel high JPEGs which can be seen in this album at Flickr.

#1

1019 08 2016_11_15 P1160735_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#2

1019 15 2016_11_15 P1160763_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#3

1019 20 2016_11_15 P1160796_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#4

1019 22 2016_11_15 P1160799_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#5

1019 23 2016_11_15 P1160857_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#6

1019 25 2016_11_15 P1160889_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#7

1019 27 2016_11_15 P1160893_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

#8

1019 34 2016_11_15 P1160944_DxO RAW01a100 SP7 LR6 by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

 

[sarrasani]

very good! and good also detail at these dimesions.
all the best,
sandro

 

[MidnightUK]

Not only beautiful photos, but its really interesting to see the subjects close up. Thank you for posting these.

 

[Graham]

As always Nick you have captured the subject very well, some great detail with great sharpness showing.
I wonder what a original file would look like before you convert/sharpen and all the other bits you do would look like.

 

[Cloudforest]

Lovely work Nick, #7 is a particular favourite.

 

[GardenersHelper]

very good! and good also detail at these dimesions.
all the best,
sandro

Not only beautiful photos, but its really interesting to see the subjects close up. Thank you for posting these.

Lovely work Nick, #7 is a particular favourite.

As always Nick you have captured the subject very well, some great detail with great sharpness showing.
I wonder what a original file would look like before you convert/sharpen and all the other bits you do would look like.

Thanks all.

That's a good question Graham. I have extracted the embedded JPEGs from the raw files. Here they are.


P1160735_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


P1160763_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


P1160796_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


P1160799_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


P1160857_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


P1160889_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


P1160893_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


P1160944_embeddedJPEG by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

 

[Graham]

Thanks Nick, only on my phone at but the difference is still noticeable. Thanks for the time to repost the unedited photos.

 

[sandboxmagician]

Really lovely details on these!
There's a few wasps near me which I want to try snap but I'm a bit worried about getting stung! Were they largely not bothered by you?

 

[Graham]

Really lovely details on these!
There's a few wasps near me which I want to try snap but I'm a bit worried about getting stung! Were they largely not bothered by you?

If you pose a threat to them then they will defend themselves, best if you see the odd one or 2 but nowhere near a nest. Normally they will fly away but if your slow and stealthy you'll be fine.

 

[GardenersHelper]

Really lovely details on these!
There's a few wasps near me which I want to try snap but I'm a bit worried about getting stung! Were they largely not bothered by you?

Thanks. I'm no expert about this, but I get the impression that if I don't get in the way of what they are doing they don't take any notice of me. As a rather extreme example, last year we had a wasp nest in the garden with an entrance hole at ground level. I spent hours and hours kneeling in front of the hole with the camera lens about eight inches from the hole, trying to capture photos of them in flight. This sort of thing.


0808 02 2015_08_xx FZ200 R150 P1050098_DxO LR 1300h by gardenersassistant, on Flickr



0765 04 2015_08_11 P1020634 LR by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


0765 11 2015_08_11 P1020933 LR by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


0764 04a 2015_08_11 IMG_0117 LR by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

They were flying past me, close to the left and right, but they didn't stop to hassle me. The only problem I had was when I tried photographing them at night. There were half a dozen at the entrance, guarding it I imagine. They were perfectly still when I arrived but the light quickly made them active and they buzzed around my head. I backed off straight away.

I was told it was a bit dangerous doing what I did, spending all that time so close to so many of them, because apparently they can turn on you. Also, this year we had a nest with the entrance hole in one of our flower beds and my wife was cutting down some stuff near it and she got stung.

By and large though, and especially when photographing them away from the nest when they are busy doing their own thing, I've never had a problem.

 

[ChrisA]

Prefer you edited ones. #7 is the pick of the bunch.

 

[GardenersHelper]

Prefer you edited ones.

Thanks Chris. That's a relief!

#7 is the pick of the bunch.

I'm always a bit nervous about the narrowness of the DoF with head-on shots. I do like that one though - it's the pose that does it for me I think.