Let this "bee" a lesson to me!!

[twebster]

Hi y'all,

On my outing to the lower Salt River, this week, I came across these beautiful prickly pear cactus flowers. I snapped the usual pics of the blooms then I started concentrating on shooting pics of the bees that were visiting the flowers. I was trying to catch the bees in flight, whether landing or taking off. Well, I'm not too happy with the results...





There's a couple of lessons to be learned here...First, set the camera for "second curtain flash sync". It doesn't really matter with stationary subjects which shutter curtain triggers the flash. It does matter with moving subjects, though. "First curtain sync" fires the flash just after the first shutter curtain has started to travel across the film/sensor plane. "Second curtain shutter sync" fires the flash just 1.5 miliseconds before the second curtain starts to travel across the film/sensor plane.

There is a subtle but very important difference. Using first curtain sinc, any light trails produced by a brightly lighted, moving subject appear to point forward making the subject look like it is moving backwards, just as in my photos, above. This happens because the flash illuminates the subject at the beginning of its motion across the film/sensor plane. Second curtain sync, however, fires the flash after the subject has moved across the film plane. Any motion trails recorded from a brightly lighted subject moving across the film/sensor plane are recorded more naturally, seeming to trail behind the subject as they should.

Second...If you don't want motion trails in your flash images (I didn't) make sure the f. stop and shutter speed are set such that the camera doesn't record much of an ambient exposure. I had my shutter set to the highest sync speed of 1/200 sec but I had not stopped down the f. stop enough. I could easily have stopped the lens down another f. stop or two and would have eliminated the motion trails entirely. Oh well. Some lessons are hard-learned.

Best regards as always, my friends

[Wim van Egmond]

There is not reason to be unhappy about these results, Tom, They look very nice. Nice composition and colour, and the bees are looking good as well!

Intersting thoughts about the flash. I will try to use a bit more natural light myself. I have been doing some macro but I am not satisfied with the light.

Wim

[Ken Ramos]

The photographs look pretty good Tom but I see what you mean. I would have preferred stop action too. Thanks for the tips.

[Moebius]

Hmmm, I feel silly in asking, but what motion trails? I can't see what you are referring to. I think both of these are excellent. The only thing to me that gives the illusion that they are moving backwards is the fact the you caught the wings in their forward position.

Ken Nelson

[rjlittlefield]

...what motion trails?

Ken,

Tom has been off the forum for a while, so I'll jump in and try to answer this one.

Take a look at the first picture. At the back of the head, at the edge of the eye, there are some pixel-size white pointlights, probably reflections of the sun. Extending from each pointlight toward the 11 o'clock position, there are some straight light streaks, about 1/4" long on my monitor.

Those streaks are motion trails.

They are faint images of the same pointlights, recorded after the flash went off, as the bee moved in the 11 o'clock direction.

Because we are used to seeing streaks where an object has been, not where it is going, these after-the-flash motion trails suggest that the bee was moving downward, toward 5 o'clock.

If the flash had occurred at the end of the exposure, when the second curtain started to close, then the motion trails would be in the expected position, along the past trail of the bee.

Once you see the motion trails at the eye in the first picture, you can find lots more of them elsewhere on the body. It's interesting that the big highlight on the abdomen is not streaked -- probably means that one is from the flash, not the sun.

Perhaps the trails are not distracting until your attention is called to them. I didn't notice them either, until Tom mentioned them.

And they're a lot less obvious in the second picture. (Pretty hard to find actually, and I'm not sure that what I'm finding really are motion trails!)

I agree, these are great shots as they stand. It would be cool to see slow motion video. That second shot shows the bee's wings in a position that I've certainly never thought about them reaching!

--Rik