Hawker dragonfly in flight - a photo on Flickriver

            This dragonfly was travelling very fast all the time, so capturing it was very tricky indeed.  I ended up turning off autofocus completely as it just couldn't get a lock fast enough.  As the dragonfly flew towards or away from me I panned and tried to turn the focus dial to keep pace with it.  I kept both eyes open and only pressed the shutter when the dragonfly was visible to my camera eye (which wasn't very often, hence keeping the other eye open).  I used shutter-priority mode with a shutter speed of 1/1000 to freeze motion and ISO 800 so that I could use a reasonably small aperture, to allow for poor focus.  I turned off IS as well since it isn't much use when panning at high shutter speeds.  This was the best shot of the bunch from an hour's shooting.

You may notice the ragged wing - he had several fights with another dragonfly, sadly none of which I managed to get in-focus.

ISO 800, f/9, 1/1000 second, shutter-priority mode, manual focus
Canon 40D, 300mm f4 IS, 1.4x converter

Taken on: July 27, 2008

Tags:

dragonfly

macro

flight

hawker

wpy « less

Sets appears in: • Insects in flight • My Explore more » • Macro • Dragonflies & damselflies « less

Groups appears in: • Insects in Flight • U left me in Awe...(invited images only)

Camera: Canon EOS 40D, f/9.0, 1/1000 sec, 420mm, ISO 800 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Canon EOS 40D
Aperture:	f/9.0
Exposure Time:	0.001 sec (1/1000)
Focal Length:	420mm
ISO:	800
Exposure Bias:	+1 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Shutter speed priority AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	sRGB
Software:	Adobe Photoshop CS3 Windows
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