Photographing Beetles

Submitted by matthew_ellis24 on Sat, 23/02/2008 - 13:45.

Photography

Photographing pinned beetles

There are many different techniques for photographing beetles, some require expensive equipment such as ring flashes, macro lenses and specialised lights. But the techniques discussed below are all relatively low tech. These photos have all been taken with a Canon 20D digital SLR, but any good quality camera should be able to produce similar results. Large sized versions of the images can be found here (0.5Mb). We will start with the simplest technique and work up. Happily this also coincides with increasing photo quality.

Technique a: Long exposure

For this technique you need to have good natural light.
Position the pinned beetles on a white background and steady the camera on a
tripod or table top. Due to the size of these beetles it's important to have
a high depth of field in order to get as much of the beetle in focus as
possible. By stopping down the aperture you necessarily need to increase the
exposure. I often find that at f15
I need a 1 - 5 second exposure depending on how bright it is. Your camera
should tell you what will work best. If your camera is able it is also a good
idea to "bracket" your shot. This means taking a photo one stop either side
of your selected settings.

Pros	Cons
Cheap	Heavy shadows
Simple	Unreliable (depends on light)

Technique b: Built in flash

This is not really a technique in itself, but is worthy of
mention. Simply use the built in flash on the camera. If the camera allows
then it is a good idea to increase the depth of field. Although the flash is
often timed to work for shutter speeds of 1/60 it does not matter a great
deal if it is longer. This image was taken on automatic settings which is why
the depth of field isn't great.

Pros	Cons
Cheap	Medium shadows
Simple	Unreliable (depends on camera!)

Technique c: External flash

This technique requires an external flash unit. You can
achieve different results by playing with the diffuser on the flash and my
mounting the flash away from the body of the camera. Already we can see a huge
improvement over the first two techniques...and it gets better

Pros	Cons
Quite reliable	Light shadows
Not so dependant on light	Flash unit can be expensive

Technique d: White card

This technique requires some construction! Find a
cardboard box, open all the flaps, and cut it in half. Cover it in white
paper and you should end up with something like below:

Now place the beetles inside this make shift studio and
use the external flash technique as described above. The white card helps to
distribute the light and stop too many harsh shadows or flash white out on
shiny beetles. However because there is still direct light falling on the
beetles you do still get shadows

Pros	Cons
Reliable	Some construction required
Very light shadows	Some construction required

Technique e: The bucket

This technique again requires some construction. You need
a bucket, as close to white as you can get. Then cut a hole in the top of it
that is big enough for you to see the beetles through, but keep it as small
as possible. You should have something like this:

You will need at least 2 flash units for this as well as
photosensitive slaves. These slaves attach to the hotshoe of the flash and
fire off the unit when it detects another flash. The aim here is to shine
light ON the bucket, but not IN the bucket. Ideally you want two flash units
(one wired to the camera and one on a slave) at either side of the bucket.
Before you take the photos you need to set a custom white balance to account
for the not quite white bucket. See your camera manual for instructions on
this.

Place the beetles inside the bucket, set a nice high
aperture and exposure and take photos!