Not much around at the moment, I think the wind has blown everything away, but I did find this Brachystomella parvula sheltering in a clump of Moss. It didn't really move away from the Moss and spent most of its time under it, I did get a few shots of it climbing the Moss and in one shot I managed to get the underside of the Brachystomella, see comments.

I took these using my MP-E at x5 on a 1.4x teleconverter and 36mm of extension tubes using an F/5.6 aperture. I hope these high winds calm down soon, it's no good for Collembola photography as stuff really does get blown away LOL :o)

Having a few connectivity problems, so please excuse any slowness on my behalf :o)

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A very small and very young Zebra Spider I found this morning on a white uPVC window ledge, almost gave me studio conditions, I must admit shooting against a white background is an absolute nightmare and I hope I have done my subject some justice.

This little one was very slow and sluggish, I think it had been caught out by the rain and coldish conditions. I was really pleased to find this, especially as after half an hour in the garden was resulting in not very much.

Hope everyone has a great weekend :o)

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Found another courting pair of Common Darters and was able to get a shot with the MP-E 65mm, this was at x1 magnification, would have liked to have tried a higher magnification, but they decided to fly off :)

This was my new Pseudoscorpion find yesterday, I found this under a small wooden log, a very well camouflaged species as well. I'm not yet sure of a species ID for this one yet, so if anyone recognises the species then I would be grateful. Quite a large species at 3-4mm in length, covered in odd hairs and seems to cover itself in debris for camouflage purposes :o)

I think it may possibly be Chernes cimicoides.

This one was very stealthy in its movements and fortunately was very slow moving. The other species I find can be very flighty indeed. The only thing I wish I had done was transfer it on to a cleaner background, the background surface in this photo shows how well this species can blend in with its environment.

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A Polyommatus icarus showing off his colours on a dried grass seed head, I think it's a male, they seemed to find a good perch and then would open up those gorgeous wings, I guess this is to let other males know that the territory is taken, that's my guess anyway. They do patrol their territory searching out females.

Anyway, I just liked this shot, seemed to work with the soft colours :o)

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This was a seriously tiny Weevil, probably about the same size as a Globular Springtail (2-3mm), I quite liked the white hairs on the dark elytra, not really sure what the species is yet, I'm thinking Apion sp, I will have to go back to the books later.

This one was on a fence post covered in algae, I had to tone down the greens as they were very overpowering, I'm starting to really love Lightroom, really love the dust spot removal tool, I think I'm going to have to clean the old sensor soon :o)

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A luvved up pair of Common Blue Butterflies from Friday afternoon, it was a grey and chilly day and this pair were quite motionless. The main issue was trying to get a shot full stop, the wind kept blowing these about and the poor light meant I was only getting 1/100, so I had to up the ISO to 800 and I was able to get 1/160, I was using a monopod as well. I was also using my flash on ETTL and set at the -3 bias setting. The other issue was lining this pair up to get the best of the DOF.

Well I'm hoping to get out with the camera tomorrow, just need to work out where to go????

Hope everyone has a great weekend :o)

I spent the afternoon in woodland seeing what I could find, as well as many Collembola I found a few of these sleeping Weevils, these were quite small and were about 3-4mm at a guess, thought it was rather cute in a hairy way LOL :o) If anyone has any idea of an ID for this then I shall be most grateful :o)

Anyway, a 19 image handheld focus stack using an f/6.3 aperture, ISO320, and a 1/160 shutter speed, I had upped the ISO a bit to enable a faster refresh rate with the flash. The MP-E was used at x5 magnification. I really must kick myself out of bed tomorrow for some Damsel portraits.

A bit annoyed with the weather, especially after watching the morning news and being promised glorious sunshine, oh well wasn't too bad I guess :o)

Thanks to joe with a camera, ID is Barypeithes pellucidus, a Hairy Spider Weevil :o)

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The above shows 3 images featuring Sminthurides nr penicillifer a species first found by andybadger (A. Murray)

www.flickr.com/photos/89396233@N00/sets/72157629957560853/

Each image was shot in a different location, over the past few days I have been looking at likely habitats for this species and have found 2 new locations.

The first image on the left was at the Colwick Park site, the middle image was at Iremongers Pond (Wilford) and on the right was at Holme Pit Pond (Clifton). So it's looking like this species may actually be quite common, it's just not many people go out looking for them. Also interesting to mention that this species has now been found in Germany by Jan van Duinen :-

www.flickr.com/photos/fotos-janvanduinen/15003531560/

And K. Beck :-

www.flickr.com/photos/99452971@N07/15218555402/

It seems this species favours still/slow moving, well vegetated and clean water. Also all of the 3 locations are linked to the River Trent, so it is likely this species is present in most similar habitats along the length of the river and its tributaries.

I liked the image on the right, I got a Sminthurides nr penicillifer and a Sminthurides aquaticus in the same shot for comparison :o)

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A very juvenile Dicyrtomina ornata on a bit of old wood, I had placed the wood on a ledge on a brick wall to provide a stable surface to photograph this one and the brick also gave a very pleasing backdrop.

I will hopefully find some larger macro subjects soon, but I still want to find Collembola, so I think this Summer may provide a very mixed bag of subjects. Of out early to try and find Bee Flies again, Nottinghamshire always appears to be the last place to find anything LOL :o)

VIEW ON BLACK :o)

They are on the rise, literally covering the fences at Wollaton Park. this one decided to start marching straight at my lens and I was quite pleased with the look of this, I used a leaf for some background colour.

I did see some Orange Ladybirds, Ten-spot Ladybirds and Cream-spot Ladybirds, but they were most definitely out numbered by these guys :)

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Thought I'd mix it up tonight with my first natural light focus stack of a Hoverfly. As I had left a crucial bit of kit at home today I decided to try some natural light work. I could not believe it when this handsome Hoverfly stayed completely still for me, I think it was warming up in the morning sun.

Anyway, this is a handheld natural light focus stack of 37 images, I used my MP-E at just over 1x mag and was on aperture priority, I had an aperture of F/5, ISO 500 and the shutter speed was averaging at 1/160.

A beautiful Dasysyrphus albostriatus, quite a handsome looking Hoverfly this one :o)

ID correction :- Dasysyrphus albostriatus

thanks to Mark Horton and Bob at Blashford :o)

Just to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas, hope you all have a wonderful time.

Just a collage of some of my favourite finds and images of 2013, 2013 was a good year for new finds and I really enjoyed focus stacking anything I could find, especially focus stacking Odonata and Collembola. Thanks to all my contacts and let's hope 2014 is an even better year :o)

VIEW LARGE & EXTRAS IN COMMENTS

Another stack from the weekend, this is an Orchesella villosa, they are fairly large as Collembola go and this one was about 5mm in length, they can be quite variable in colour, but most I see tend to be a tan brown with dark stripes. These guys can often be found under fallen branches and bark. They do make quite easy subjects for stacking as they tend to stay still when found, I managed about 6 sets of stacks of this one before it got fed up with me.

This is another handheld focus stack of 17 images, I used my MP-E at x4 magnification and an F/5.6 aperture. This is the first time I've actually seen the collophore and furca of one of these guys.

Also just ordered "Biology Of Springtails" by S.Hopkin, not a cheap book, but looking forward to reading it :o)

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A real incy wincy Spider at Wollaton Park, this is a full frame uncropped Araniella sp. spider at Wollaton Park. This one was taken using the 1.4x Extender and the MP-E at x5 magnification, these are pretty small spiders at about 5-6mm, thought it was a bit different and also kind of cute :)

Well I went out at about 9am this morning as it was my best chance of some calmer weather, still a bit breezy, but I found a sheltered spot. My intention was to try some Collembola focus stacks with my old 1000D (The 5D MKII is in for cleaning). It was nice just to use the MP-E on Collembola without any teleconverters or extension tubes, these Dicyrtomina saundersi were almost frame fillers at x5 magnification.

So this is a female Dicyrtomina saundersi and it is a 5 frame handheld focus stack, I was quite happy with the results on this one and there are some nice details to be seen here. This individual was about 1.5-2mm in length and was a well behaved subject :o)

Hope everyone had a great weekend :o)

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Not the best macro day today, lots of frost about under rocks and wood, but I did find this Dicyrtoma fusca under a frozen bit of wood, it was surrounded by ice, yet within minutes of taking this shot it was moving about. This species seems to be quite hardy and I have found it in frozen environments before.

I was also trying my old Nikon SB900 flash with my Canon in manual settings, not sure if I will use this again, I kept getting some shots with a black bar at the bottom, I kind of think this is a sync problem (I hope LOL), I will swiftly move back to using my 580EXII :0)

VIEW ON BLACK :0)

This was another find on Friday's walk, I found lots of these very small Globular Springtails, all of them had dark bodies with orange legs and antennae, these were about 0.7mm at a guess, very small and mostly very active, they would ping away at the slightest disturbance, so when this one which was preoccupied with a meal stayed put, I was well chuffed. I used live view to focus on this, best thing about live view is you can zoom in at x10 mag and get good focus, very useful on something so very small. This was taken at x5 and has been heavily cropped :o)

The closest match i can find for this one is Sminthurinus igniceps, but if anyone can confirm this I shall be grateful, I have included other views in the comments :o)

Thanks to Frans for ID help Sminthurinus aureus forma ochropus, a dark colour form of Sminthurinus aureus, apparently the second photographic record of this colour form, so not too bad going LOL :0)

HAPPY EASTER EVERYONE :o)

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A lovely Blue Tit from a week or so back, I absolutely love these guys and they are so much fun to watch, full of life and energy, always on the go and such stunning colours. I always take bird food with me when I go to Wollaton, usual scenario is I put food out and the Squiggles hog it all, not this time I had peanuts in their shells to distract the Squiggles LOL :o)

Taken with the 400mm F/5.6 on a 36mm extension tube :o)

I'm hoping to take the camera out at the weekend, really looking forward to the weekend now, forgotten how important weekends really are, absolutely shattered today, the new job is definitely a physically active job LOL :o)

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Two completely different Common Darter expressions, also taken with two different cameras, the Canon 5D MKII and the Canon 1000D, both using the MP-E 65mm, but can you tell which was taken by which, is there a noticeable difference or not :)

I will divulge the answer later today :)

Sorry another Dicyrtomina saundersi, there really is not much about and everywhere is so very waterlogged, many of my usual macro haunts are out of the question at present, I was at the Highfields Park yesterday and there were pools of water everywhere. I walked past the Trent this morning and it looks close to bursting its banks, one more night of rain could do it.

Anyway, this is a 4 image focus stack of a Dicyrtomina saundersi on some very damp wood and it is also covered in condensation, I quite liked the angle as well :o)

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Well I managed a trip out this afternoon, not much about as it was still quite chilly, but I did spot a few of these guys sitting on Dandelions, this is one of the Tenthredo sp. Sawflies and I'm not sure which, although it is a species I see commonly, but I know there are many similar species in this Genus.

Anyway as it was cold this one allowed me to take an 18 image handheld focus stack of its noggin, I used ISO 320, Aperture F/5.6 and a 1/160 shutter speed. Soon after this the Sawfly started to stir and promptly flew off.

Possible ID :- Tenthredo arcuata or Tenthredo notha

Hope everyone has a grand week :o)

I found this poor guy all on his own in the world yesterday, I was quite surprised to find a Hoverfly (Possibly Syrphus sp) still around in November, not another Hoverfly to be seen anywhere.

The only other Hoverflies I have seen lately are Drone Flies, but that was a week ago and Drone Flies seem to be the last to vanish, so finding this guy was perhaps a tad unusual :)

VIEW LARGE, some nice eye details here :)

A bit of reflecting on the year, so I'm going back in the archives. This is possibly my favourite find of 2012, the tiny Caprainea marginata, this is a fairly rare species in the UK and I was fortunate to find a colony of them here in Nottingham back in April. It seems this pretty pink species is active for a relatively short period, they seemed to be about for the month of April and after that they virtually vanished. So hopefully in 2013 I will be able to find these guys early on and see how long they are active for. This one was on the underside of a fallen leaf and I captured it as it was climbing over a lump of dirt.

Has anyone had a weird surge in their stats today? I had over 7000 views in a relatively short period of time, usually I average 400-500 in a day.

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They have risen from beyond the grave and are coming to get you, MUAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN, really struggled thinking of stuff, so thought I'd go with a Damselfly from this year, used a number of editing programs, including GIMP, Picnik, Picasa, Lightroom and Corel Paintshop, none of them had everything I wanted so a lot of messing about involved. See if anyone can get the geotag reference :o)

Answer to the geotag placement, is George A Romero, after attending university in Pittsburgh he went onto a film making career with films like "Night Of The Living Dead", "Dawn Of The Dead" and "Day Of The Dead", he filmed much of his early work in and around Pittsburgh, hence the geotag :o)

I might have a go at something else tonight, if I can get even more inspired :o)

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Some nice habitus shots of a lovely Sminthurides malmgreni, this is a very common Sminthurides species and can commonly be found on the surface and near bodies of standing water, often found with Sminthurides aquaticus and Podura aquaticus. They can also be found in boggy areas, I also find them on the surface of large puddles in fields. With recent weather conditions I have noticed an explosion in Sminthurides species in general.

This one is a female and was about 0.8mm long, the males are a lot smaller at about 0.4mm and the males also have specially modified antennae for grasping the females antennae in their courtship ritual.

I used my MP-E at x5 magnification on 112mm of extension tubes and an F/6.3 aperture :o)

I hope everyone has a great weekend :o)

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I was honoured and privileged to finally witness a full Damselfly emergence, possibly one of the most amazing things in the natural world to watch, I've captured most of the process and have got to workout the best way to present it.

For now I thought I'd upload this image, I could look at this for hours, now next one is to watch a Dragonfly emerge :)

These guys are virtually everywhere I look, they were on almost every leaf I picked up whilst walking around the Sensory Garden at Wollaton Park yesterday. Each leaf has it's own colour properties and I really liked the reds that this particular leaf produced. The other good thing about leaf finds is that you can get some nice angles on your subjects. This is Dicyrtomina saundersi and they are grazing on the mould and algae that grow on the decaying leaves.

Infectious song, I keep hearing everywhere :0)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQmEd_UeeIk&ob=av2e

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I was so thrilled to find one of these wonderfully coloured male Katiannidae genus nov.1 sp. nov, they are one of the most striking Collembola that I find, I just love those firey reds and oranges mixed in with those black spots, very beautiful indeed.

This guy was really getting stuck into the algae on this wooden fence on the path around Harrison's Plantation in Wollaton. Funny thing is I only ever see the male Katiannidae on this fence, have yet to find any of the female Katiannidae here, also I still can't locate any shrubs that they may have colonised, saying that there are lots of gardens that back onto this fine nature reserve, I have included a few extra shots in the comments, showing this beautiful Collembola :o)

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A male Genus nov.2 sp. nov. from Sheffield, this is one of the exotic Collembola that can be found at the Sheffield Botanical Gardens. This I thought was an interesting sequence as it shows the Springtail grooming with reflections.

In two of the images (top row 3rd and 4th) you can see the eversible vesicles being used for cleaning. Some Collembola have the ability of producing tube-like vesicles from the collophore, these vesicles can be used for absorbing fluids, cleaning, self righting and even as jump stabilisers. Interesting to note that the Springtail uses the legs to help guide the vesicle to the area it wants to clean.

Info from Fran's :-not all Collembola have tube-like collophore vesicles. In fact in most Collembola it are just short balloon like vesicles, even half balloons. Only in Symplypleona the vesicles are tube-like. Except in Sminthuridoidea, where the vesicles are short as in Entomobryomorpha. IMHO, this is an indication that Sminthuridoidea are the basis of Symphypleona.

You can also see the production of a cleaning droplet from the mouth, this is then transferred to the feet, the Springtail can then move the droplet foot to foot and use the droplet for grooming.

This was taken with my MP-E on the 1.4x teleconverter, the springtail here was less than 1mm in size :o)

This is also the first time I can say I've photographed the male of this species :o)

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Well I went back to Sheffield Botanical Gardens today and found some very interesting Collembola. This one in particular is very interesting, these were the smallest Sminthurinus species I have found to date, they were about 0.5mm-0.6mm, the closest match I can find is Sminthurinus minutus, but I think this is an American species and I can find no British records.

The head has very distinctive orange pigmentation, white eyebrows and a clear band across the middle of the head, the abdomen is black with underlying orange/red (No white spots on any of the individuals) and orange antennae, the ends of the legs look to be orange. Any ideas Frans????

These were found in the hothouse/glasshouse, so there is a chance they are imports. I really struggled photographing these, I could hardly see these and I think I was getting misting on my lens.

***Just been informed that this is likely to be Sminthurinus minutus and is the first European record of this species :o)***

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A female Common Blue Damselfly early doors on Sunday morning, I found this little one sitting on a blade of grass with her wings in X-wing bokeh formation. This was the closest I came to finding a Damselfly with dew on it, there are a few drops on her head. It seems that a single dark band across the eyes is a distinguishing feature with Common Blue Damselflies.

This was a handheld focus stack, but how many images?

Answer was 17 :o)

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I spent the afternoon looking for invertebrates in local woodland today, so I couldn't resist a few Allacma fusca portraits whilst they are still plentiful. This one is a 12 image handheld focus stack using my MP-E at full magnification on 72mm of extension tubes and my 1.4x teleconverter using an F/5.0 aperture. I had placed the stick this guy was on onto a fallen tree and I used a blue fake flower as a background. This Springtail was about 2mm in length :o)

I find these guys will happily stay put for a focus stack, especially if you get the flash power down, which at this magnification is no easy task, I had to use an ISO of 400, it didn't help being in woodland as well, with all the leaves still on not much light gets through :o)

Well it seems that Flickr is playing up still, having problems uploading, so I hope this works :o)

Hope everyone has a great Sunday, sounds like it will be a wet one though :o)

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A Dicyrtomina saundersi in its Fortress Of Solitude, I should have coloured one of the crystals green in hindsight.

This is an 8 image focus stack in Zerene, the sequence was taken in February this year, I hope I get an opportunity to do a similar set of shots this Winter, well the Daily Express was saying the other day that we are going to have the coldest Winter for 100 years, but then that's the Daily Express LOL :o) As I remember this was taken after a very frosty morning, I went out turning over bits of wood and found this one on these ice crystals, these Collembola are Winter active and I believe they have some form of antifreeze in their bodies.

I stacked this in PMax and DMap and edited the DMap using the PMax image and other frames. This was shot at x5 on my MP-E and shot at f/10. I tried to stack this in CombineZP originally, but this one was moving its antennae and I couldn't edit it in CombineZP.

Saw a new novelty bit of kit today, it's an adapter for lenses that can turn them into spotting scopes, just wondering if it would work as a macro spotting scope LOL :o)

www.wexphotographic.com/buy-kenko-lens2scope-angled-spott...

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An as yet unidentified Leafhopper Nymph found on the underside of a leaf on a Tree (Not sure what the tree was), this one was about 2-3mm in length and was a most cooperative subject and stayed put for a number of stacks. There were lots of shed skins under other leaves, but this was the only Leafhopper I could find. The adults would probably have flown away as soon as I disturbed the leaves.

This was a 12 image handheld focus stack at an aperture of F/6.3 at x5 magnification on my MP-E. If anyone can ID this one I would be grateful, I did look on the British Bugs website, but could not find a match :o)

I hope everyone has a fabulous weekend, thought Flickr was going to be down all day, glad it's up and running again :o)

I'm wondering if this could be Edwardsiana species? Possibly Edwardsiana rosae

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A rather lovely Monobella grassei which I photographed a few days back, I chose this image as a main as I managed to get a groovy green Mite in focus as well. This Monobella grassei was about 1.5mm long, you can also see its adapted mouthparts between the antennae, these guys have pretty much a liquid diet and the mouthparts are a cone like protrusion. I have included a variety of aspect shots to illustrate the wonderful textures on these beautiful Collembola. Tricky to get everything in focus as I was using my 1,4x teleconverter and 36mm of extension tubes with an F/5.6 aperture, if I use a smaller aperture the results get too soft to use :o)

There are also 3 images at the end of the comments of a Folsomia species, anyway, it's a new one for the list, but I didn't really think the images were quite good enough for a stand alone upload. ID possibly F. manolachei, thanks to Frans for ID help :0)

I wish everyone a wonderful weekend :o)

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Really pleased to finally see one of these guys in the process of moulting and even more chuffed that I managed a focus stack as well. In the main shot the Dicyrtomina saundersi is pulling the antennae and collophore out from the old cuticle, it seemed quite a task :o)

Like many other Arthropods, Collembola moult to enable further growth and also to reach maturity, they will also continue to moult on attaining maturity, in some species they moult 40x or more. The time between each moult varies with species, it can be a few days for juvenile instars and longer for older instars. Also did you know that the maximum authenticated longevity for a Springtail in a laboratory is 5 years and 7 months in Pseudosinella impediens, which I find absolutely amazing :o)

The main image is a 7 image focus stack at x7 magnification, I used an F/6.3 aperture, would have preferred using F/5.6, but I was trying to get a quick stack as this guy was always moving, there was some movement in the stack, but only slight and I was able to edit around the problem areas. This was a relatively juvenile individual at about 1mm, I have some stacks of it post emergence which I may post later :o)

Hope everyone has a great weekend :o)

VIEW LARGE and EXTRA IMAGES IN COMMENTS

Thought I'd experiment with something different, I took a small mirror with me today, the idea was if the Deer weren't showing then I'd try some experimental macro, I think this effect is related to flash fall off but with a mirror, I quite liked the whole idea, so I guess Reflective Flash Fall Off Ultra Macro is the technique, it reallly illuminates the subject, I'm going to try a better reflective surface next time, the mirror I was using was a plastic signalling mirror. This is a Sminthurinus species Collembola, about 0.5mm long, taken with the MP-E and 112mm of extension tubes. Could be a juvenile Sminthurinus reticulatus with orange banding. Please note this is something I was inspired to try by EvilEyeGoshawk :0)

No Deer today, they were all on the other side of the golf course, Still it was a fine day and spent a while photographing a few different subjects, oh and I nearly got hit by a golf ball that literally landed 6 inches from where I had my camera set up :o)

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Well it is certainly that time of the year, with the leaves falling so quickly, as well as the temperatures falling and increased precipitation, there has been an explosion of Dicyrtomina species, virtually every leaf I picked up had a few of these on the underside. This is a male Dicyrtomina saundersi at about 1.5-2mm, the cross markings on the posterior and the colour change in the antennae help ID this species :o)

This is a 16 image handheld focus stack at F/5.6 using my MP-E at x5 magnification. These guys are great stacking subjects, it may take a while, but they will often stop dead in their tracks, also try a stack as quickly as you can after turning over a leaf. One thing that helps is getting the flash power down as low as possible, this often means increasing the ISO, however, I rarely go above 400, reducing the shutter speed to 1/125 helps and using a wide aperture also helps (A wider aperture will give sharper details and will also require more shots in the stack).

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A very chilled male Azure Damselfly, chillaxing on a very very hot afternoon. This was a rather beautiful fully matured male Azure and I thought it might be interesting to try a blue background for this one.

This is a seven image stack taken at F/8, somehow I managed to ace the specular highlights on this stunner and I'm not exactly sure how. Bet you had thought that I wasn't going to do anymore portraits, but then out of the blue LOL :o)

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1st of April and no joke I still have not seen a decent sized insect, after 2 long walks this Easter the biggest thing I saw was a small fly, so next best thing and only thing I knew I could find were Collembola(Which are no longer classed as insects, they used to be but now they are in their own class Collembola within the Superclass Hexapoda, the Superclass containing the following classes Collembola, Protura, Diplura, Insecta).

Anyway, this I think is a Stenacidia violacea female, she did not appear to have any subdivisions of her 4th antennal segment. Taken with 72mm of extension tubes on my MP-E at x5, this was under 1mm in length :o)

There is an area of stony ground covered in moss on one of my Melton walks and there is always a good population of these there. It was another cold start today and when photographing these I had to put my gloves on to keep my hands from freezing LOL, don't think the temperature got up higher than 4C today although the sun did make a late appearance. Sorry for my absence, just not been taking any photo's lately.

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A portrait of the male Calopteryx splendens taken in the early hours of the morning. I was fortunate to find this one a few metres away from the lovely female Calopteryx splendens I photographed on the same morning. This guy was covered in fine dew droplets and I always love the metallic blues of these guys. The flight season of these guys is May to September, but the height of activity is usually around June and July, I must admit that these are getting a bit harder to find now.

I hope eveyone has a wonderful weekend. I did make a discovery today, I was messing about with Windows Movie Editor and realised that I can slow down video, so I have taken a section of my hunting Demoiselle sequence and slowed it down, looks really cool, so may post it later :o)

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A Hylaeus species Bee (Female), I keep seeing these landing on the stonework of Wilford Bridge and after a while I managed to get a few shots of one. I've no idea of the exact species, looking at the BWARS site the Hylaeus species all look pretty similar, so if anyone can give an exact ID then I would be grateful.

Info from Wiki

Hylaeus is a large (>500 species) and diverse cosmopolitan genus within the bee family Colletidae.

The genus of bees consists of generally small, black and yellow/white wasp-like species. The resemblance to wasps is enhanced by the absence of a scopa, which is atypical among bees.

Hylaeus carry pollen in the crop, rather than externally, and regurgitate it into the cell where it will be used as larval food. Like most colletids, the liquid provisions are sealed inside a membranous cellophane-like cell lining.

Nests are typically in dead twigs or plant stems, or other similarly small natural cavities, rather than constructing or excavating their own nests as in many other bees.

This was a partial stack of 3 images, these guys do not stay put for very long and have a habit of moving during a stack.

Well what a miserable and gloomy day it was today, so here is a bit of late afternoon HDR on the embankment, this is a view of Trent Bridge and the Rushcliffe Borough Council Civic Centre. The light was fading fast and I liked the starbursts from the lights, almost seemed to make the grey of the day a bit more bearable, I also liked the leaves and moss on the steps of the embankment, I would have uploaded earlier, but Flickr was playing games again and the uploader was disabled for a while.

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Pyrrhosoma nymphula balanced on a plant stem, this one I found was very close to the ground, I think it is still in its teneral stage and will be developing stronger coloration over the next few days, the eyes will redden, the two horizontal stripes on each eye will darken and some of the area above the clypeus will yellow, I really hope I can get a stack of a mature adult in the next week or two. This individual was a most amiable subject, they do sometimes stay perfectly still for the camera, although I have noticed if I go above x3 on my MP-E they don't like the invasion of their space so much.

Anyway, a 5 stack image, could have done this in 3 as I was using F/11, this was one of the first stacks I tried, so I started off with a smaller aperture, as I got more confident I used a wider aperture.

Anyway, hope everyone has a great weekend, hoping to get out early one day this weekend :o)

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If ever a Collembola could be described as ghost like, then Sminthurides aquaticus is definitely a candidate. The females of the species grow to about 1mm in length and are mainly white in colour with a few subtle hues of blue and orange.

So here we have 3 portraits of a female, these were taken with the MP-E at x5 on 108mm of extension tubes, that's x3 36mm tubes. I used an F/5.6 aperture and a diffuser on my 430 EXII flash. If you have a garden pond then chances are you have a population of these, look along the edges of the pond for white specks, you should be able to see these with your eyes, but a magnifying glass helps a lot.

Anyway, HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO YOU ALL :o)

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A selection of 3 Sminthurinus species found on a Sunday afternoon, they were all found on fallen leaves on a patch of lawn at the Nottingham University Campus. The first one on the left I think is Sminthurinus aureus f.ochropus, there were lots of these on the fallen leaves. The middle one I'm not 100% on I think its a darker form of Sminthurinus aureus, it just looks a little different to the ones I usually find. The one on the right is a Sminthurinus elegans, these also seem to be common on lawns, I've seen so many of these this year, lots more than last year.

All of the above were roughly the same size at about 0.8mm max.

Thanks to everyone who supported yesterday's Black Day on Flickr, unfortunately I still think Flickr will go ahead with their changes, I just hope they at least try and improve on the Beta format.

Hope everyone has a great week :0)

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It''s Friday folks and the weekend starts right here, so let there be fences LOL :o)

I thought the bokeh couple in this shot looked a bit threatening and alien, I'm sure they were really nice people.

I hope everybody has an awesome weekend and I'd like to wish everyone a Happy Fence Friday :o) HFF :o)

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HFF to everybody, I've been meaning to do another Fence Friday and this is my first of 2012, taken on one of those wonderful bright and frosty mornings we had earlier this week. The sun was shining onto this fence by the roadside and I knew the frost and water on the leaves of the Brambles on the other side of the fence would supply some nice bokeh in the sunlight.

Hope everybody has a wonderful weekend, just thought I'd say that again LOL :o)

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Well another day and another Springtail photo session. Today I was messing about with backgrounds, I purchased a sheet of coloured foam which had loads of different colours, kind of like when you mixed all the coloured plasticine together as a kid.

Needless to say I found a few Dicyrtomina saundersi on my walk, so I set about a focus stack or two. This one was a 24 image handheld focus stack at x7 mag using an aperture of F/5, ISO 320 and a 1/125 shutter speed. I thought the colours were rather groovy here, also loved the symmetrical feel of the subject :o)

Was a really nice day out, a bit cold and amazed how quickly the light went, will have to get up earlier tomorrow :o)

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