A Marvel, and, Why?

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Please take a close look at this chrysanthemum lace bug. With the unaided eye, it looks like a speck of something that sluffed off a plant, sitting on the leaf. If you take a 5x magnification lens and finally manage to get a sharp picture of it (or at least acceptably so), it’s amazing what you see. Notice the intricate, beautiful details in this almost microscopic insect. Why?

I leave that to you.

A Book is Coming

I hope to be soon publishing a book on Amazon in hardback and paperback plus Kindle formats. It will be about 50 photos of dragonflies and damselflies.

There will be an announcement of its availability here when the availability becomes available.

The title will be, God’s Flying Jewels.

It will even include a poem I wrote on the last page.

This was cheaper than paying the publisher $5,900 for a pre-launch campaign, now, wasn’t it?

A Long Absence

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It’s been years. I’ve been using large film cameras and a darkroom but now I’m back to digital and nature photography. The limited time I now have has made this seem like a necessary step to keep me involved in photography.

Carolina Wren with Pupa

White-eyed Vireo

Brown-winged Swallows

Raccoon with Crayfish

Male Painted Bunting

Another Day in the Natural World

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It altogether amazes me that people can walk right past things like this and be totally consumed by whatever device they have in hand to keep them from interacting intimately with the immediate other world around them, be it their companion walking beside them, the child in a stroller, or of sights like these flowers. Maybe the general, developing impression that there is no intelligent designer who sits outside of creation contributes to the lack of wonder at the intricacy that was designed into each of these wonders. They’re taken for granted, and the tremendous leap of faith is launched that requires believing that all this was the result of random, impersonal causes.

On the more mundane side, Nikon D7100 with 36 – 72 Series E Nikon lens reversed onto the camera body. Some were taken with 26mm extension tube, some without.

Mating Damselflies, or Get a Grip, Mate!

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Always exciting anything that promises to add more bugs to the world. Nikon D7100 and just regular old 200mm f4 manual focus Micro Nikkor.

A Multi-Generation Family Portrait

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Nothing outstanding, just something I’ve had in mind to do for a while and finally got bored enough to do it. I’ve been collecting Nikon film SLR cameras off that auction site. These represent what I think is an unbroken chain from the F, front center, of around 1957, to the F6, top center, from around 2004 to the present. Yes, Nikon does still produce two film cameras, the FM10 and the F6.

I have other Nikons not in the line of royalty here:  EM, FM, FM2/T, FM3A, FE, FE2, FA, F100 and a black F2A.

Ironically, the camera used for this portrait was a Hasselblad H5-D 50 with the 50 – 110 zoom used at 110mm. A monolight was on the right about subject level with a silver umbrella reflecting the bare bulb. A large, white reflector did a little fill on the left.

I do use the cameras! They are all quite operational and most in near mint condition. I hope my son will enjoy his inheritance someday…and have the space! Or, maybe they’ll appreciate in value and he can sell them back to where they were found.