Banded Demoiselle

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thanks for viewing and comments.

Daid,

This is a very nice capture of a beautiful Demoiselle.

I noted that you used 1/13 second at F/10.

Since the subject lies in a perpendicular plane to the lens, I would have used F/4 to F/5.6 to improve the definition that your lens is capable of producing. DOF is not an issue.

I own this lens and have tested it extensively in my optical lab. Its an excellent lens shot at F/2.8, but peaks optically between F/4 and F/5.6.

The 1/13 second exposure would be quite an accomplishment hand held with a 150mm macro lens, so I assume some sort of support was used.

At F/4, your ISO could have become 100 with an exposure of 1/40 second. Now , these changes do not appear to be that much using a fixed tripod, but a lower  ISO does improves the image characteristics (less noise, etc) . The shorter exposure further assures that any micro-motion from the insect is better captured.

In macro imaging with quality optics, a subject that is still looking  is not always that "still" due to very small motions due to vibration or the subject's  motion.

Regards,  Mike

The camera was tripod mounted, so 1/13s is no problem (there was no wind). This was shot at very close distance, so DOF do is an issue. I doubt  it F/4 to F/5.6 would have cut it. Usually, I take several shots, at different apertures, so I can select the best "compromise" between sufficient DOF and highest MTF afterwards. Most of the time however, I end up selecting shost at f/8 or higher.

It is indeed a pity that the lens is at it's very best between f/4-f/8, because most of the time, I need f/8-f/11 to get sufficient DOF.  But then, this applies to most macro lenses: beyond f/8, diffraction starts to kick in. Placing the camera perfectly aligned with the subject is rather difficult, since you can only judge by the eye.

like it, thanks for sharing

Great pose and wonderful details!

Looks anly a little bit pale on my screen.

Very well done.

Nice composition.

Very beautiful image... nicely captured. Thanks for sharing.