Eye eye, Captain!

Al Denelsbeck


Aw, c’mon! Some titles you can’t resist!

This jumping spider (genus Phidippus, perhaps a Phidippus audax) produced a great pose while I was working with it, appearing to salute with its pedipalp, or maybe shield its eyes form the sun. In reality, it was cleaning its eyes, perhaps trying to wipe away the spots in its vision from my strobes going off right in its face. I have no idea if spiders get those kind of after-images or not, and its entirely possible no one does.

But I have to say, if you want a straight-on face angle on a spider, go for the jumpers – they have no problem with staring you down. They can’t quite be said to be fearless, but they prefer by far to directly face the threats that loom, and if real danger doesn’t make itself known within a few seconds, they often return to their business, providing the inspiration for stop-motion animation. They don’t walk, they simply blink into a new position slightly different from the previous one.

The pedipalps mentioned earlier are an additional set of limbs – in spiders they’re much like small legs, right alongside the chelicerae (fangs) – which may be used for sensing or food manipulation, and in males, they also serve as the method of impregnating females, having sperm deposited within them to then be inserted into the female. Dude! You eat with those things…

I like how some images can betray a lot about how they were taken, and I often look for details like this. Note the reflections in the eyes of this full-resolution crop:


The spots to the upper left are from the sun itself, but the triangular blob is the softbox on my strobe, a Lumiquest Big Bounce angled forward to provide diffuse lighting from above, and the dot below that is a mini slave strobe (triggered by detecting the light from the main strobe) strapped right to the lens, that fills in direct lighting and some shadow detail. Pay attention to such things when you see closeup photos, and you can often tell how many light sources a photographer is using, or whether they used a ring-flash.

The lighting rig was one of numerous options I tried while chasing another subject. I caught a second black widow just a few days ago, this one a northern variant (Lactrodectus variolus,) which makes sense in that I found it about 20 meters north of the previous one – it would seem the Mason-Dixon line for spiders runs right through the yard. I retained this one in an attempt to do some extreme detail images, but unlike the jumpers, widows aren’t terribly fond of facing the camera. Overnight she’d constructed a typical web of random strands in the jar I was keeping her within, but the only way to get a clear view was through the opening at the top, and she simply wasn’t ready to smile for the camera. With many attempts, I managed to snag the image below, which is clickable if you want the full effect:



While this didn’t quite show the pedipalps detail and chelicerae that I was after, I did at least catch the eyes, reflecting the flash so brightly, and the ventral markings are very distinct. The softbox controlled the reflections from the shiny black body very well, preventing contrasty bright spots, and shows some of the chitin contours. I can live with it. Okay, maybe I should have phrased that differently…

I could arrange the lighting and poses however I liked for dead specimens, which isn’t uncommon in entomology, but that’s not my approach. It’s just a personal thing, since I prefer working with live subjects despite the additional challenges; meanwhile, other photographers won’t even use captive subjects or arranged settings like I do sometimes, so it’s all a matter of taste. My in situ photos of this spider when I found her don’t show very much detail, since she was deep in a crevice of leaves and rocks and largely in shadow. I suppose I could train an assistant spider to manipulate a tiny studio strobe or reflector in such circumstances…

While i would prefer not to have too many arthropod photos here, I’m just going with what presents itself immediately at hand, and I’m in an area that’s a little too urbanized for bears and wombats. But I’m keeping an eye on my neighbor red-shouldered hawks, quite certain there are eggs in the nest now, and a five-lined skink has been making appearances in the morning on the front steps. I’m unsure if this is a Common (American, Plestiodon fasciatus) or a Southeastern variant (Plestiodon inexpectatus); the genus Plestiodon is apparently now preferred over the former Eumeces for these species. While the scientific names are preferred for accuracy over the ‘common’ or even colloquial names, which tend to be repeated for many species and can be specific to a particular culture, it would help if scientists wouldn’t keep changing them. It would help even more if they didn’t insist on bastardizing a dead language and stuck with something pronounceable. Those elite ivory-towerers!

On the subject of common names, I once conversed with an animal control officer who was recounting an argument he’d had with someone else: “She said we don’t have buzzards around here, but I see them all the time!” I was forced to point out that his opponent was correct – the large scavenger birds in the area are vultures, not buzzards; once a term gets into the language it’s difficult to keep correcting it. And the more rural you are, the more colloquial the names become, such as “chicken hawk” for red-tailed hawks and “sparrow hawk” for kestrels – I’m not even going to bring up the insects.

Yeah, on the bandwagon

Al Denelsbeck

Just in case you haven’t already come across enough recaps of the Reason Rally, I’m going to succumb shamelessly to the fad and feature a few of them myself, vicariously through several people who were able to attend. While I want to get these out of the way before recaps of Rock Beyond Belief come rolling out, I also greatly admire the various perspectives evident in the Rally.

One thing that I’ve noticed is that, given how often fervent-yet-fatuous religious folk manage to troll nearly every online manifestation of secularism and reason, they have been far fewer than expected within everything regarding the Rally that I’ve come across. Even Tim Minchin’s Pope Song barely got a negative comment, and hell, that’s intended to get negative comments – consider it trolling for folk that can’t fathom sarcastic irony. [If you haven’t heard it before, this is a better audio version where you don’t miss any of the lyrics, but the live version has the bonus of someone interpreting the song in sign language!] I can only surmise that, with the voluminous positive responses to the video and audio from the Rally, typical web-preachers felt like their support base was in small supply anymore and they didn’t feel capable of maintaining their viewpoints in a vacuum. I rather doubt that it was because too much of the content actually made sense, since they never took any notice of that before.

The speakers were great – normally one gets the chance to hear such things every now and then, here and there, but to have such a collection together in one place is fantastic, and I’m glad so many people shared their video, audio, and photos of the event. It’s very easy to find plenty of examples online, so I’m going to feature just a select few, and let you seek out more if you like.

Of all the great, practiced, experienced, and educated speakers in the lineup, my favorite is actually Adam Savage of Mythbusters. Not only a superb speaker, but he put together an informal yet compelling short speech about reason, science, and benefit:



True be told, I do disagree with him completely on one particular point – see if you can guess which one it is.

I’m a big fan of Eddie Izzard, and his performance demonstrated his ‘stream-of-consciousness’ style more than adequately. Lawrence Krauss gave a great talk as well, beating Richard Dawkins as far as I’m concerned. I haven’t yet found a good version of Greta Christina’s talk, but since her topic was the same as her new book, I’ll link to her promo video for that.

While putting this post together, altogether far too much of the video I’ve located has been terrible. So, a little tip: buy a cheap phone, one that works properly as a phone. Then buy a proper camera and/or video recorder. Or don’t, but don’t inflict such godawful shit on anyone else if you’re too “hip” to do it right, and only want to play with toys. If you reeeallllly insist on using your Tricorder, hold the fuck still!

But then, there’s this. The Thinking Atheist did his own video impressions of the Rally, and he’s not only eloquent, he has a hell of a voice and mad editing skillzzes. Just a fantastic video:


Now, here’s something a little different. The American Atheists Conference was immediately following the Rally, on March 25th and 26th, and it also had some powerful speakers. One in particular I’m going to highlight because, as nice as the video above is, this one is unedited and lacking in any dramatic music, and twice as powerful for it. Teresa Macbain [I believe this is the correct spelling, but there are several variations given from different sources] is one of three former clergy members who spoke at the convention as open atheists – Ms Macbain’s testimonial was her first under her own name. After receiving stunning applause for her admission (that’s what you hear leading into this clip,) she had a little more to say:


For all those who feel offended by atheists and our attitudes towards religion, take note: It’s not you we have issues with, it’s your ridiculous standpoints. Leave behind the arrogance and the ersatz authority, the hatred and bigotry, and everything’s cool. That’s what reason is. No foolin’.

Turn ’em off

Al Denelsbeck

I feel bad about this, because I think I should be more in the loop, but this really is the first I’ve heard about it. “Earth Hour” is tonight, between 8:30 and 9:30 PM. As a show of support for energy efficiency and easing our reliance on limited resources, people across the world are shutting down as many electrical appliances as possible for an hour tonight.

Except, it seems, in the US. Even a brief, token show of environmental awareness is a bit too much to ask in this country. Whether it’s considered impinging on the indulgences of prosperous Americans, or pandering to tree-huggers, or just not welcomed by our energy corporations, news of this event has barely appeared in any media in this country. In fact, there’s a fair chance that, if made aware of it, no small number of residents here would do exactly the opposite, turning on as many lights a possible, as if their show of defiance against ‘eco-hippies’ accomplishes anything more productive than shoring up their own weak egos. For those of you outside the US who might be reading this, yeah, we really are that juvenile in this country (okay, that’s probably not news.)

You might notice that the link above, and this one, shows lots of candles being lit, giving an unnecessary impression of what the event means. There’s no reason to even light a candle, much less a buttload of them, and while such things contribute far less to atmospheric carbon that powerplants do, they still contribute. Speaking as someone who enjoys the night and often goes out as far from lights as I can, going without light is actually pretty cool, and yes, your eyes not only adjust to the darkness, they get better with practice. Late one night, wandering in the woods searching for luminescent fungi, I stared hard at a very large patch of mushrooms trying to determine if they really were faintly glowing. But they weren’t luminescent in the slightest; the amount of reflected ambient skylight they were reflecting fooled me, since they contrasted so sharply with the dark forest floor. The photo below is a 221-second exposure under a full forest canopy, barely a patch of sky visible, and probably comes fairly close to what I was seeing.


I said “token” above, and this really is a token effort, not much of an impact at all on our energy usage when you consider how many lights and devices we have on constantly, so here’s the challenge: go for longer than an hour, more than just one night. See how well you know your way around your house (better than you might think, I suspect – our spacial awareness is pretty well developed.) Watch the backyard and see what actually moves out there when things get quiet – and that means take a listen too. Get familiar (again) with the night sky, and see how many satellites you can spot in an hour. Find a glowworm.

Did you buy a lottery ticket? Didn’t do a damn thing for you, did it? This does, and it’s a guaranteed return, even if only on your power bill. And you know what they say: “Once you go black, you never go back.”

Have fun!

Personal god

Al Denelsbeck

Walkabout podcast – Personal god

I am, if nothing else, a fan of perspective. One of the greatest benefits of critical thinking is that it can often encourage people to take stock of a situation, compare it against other experiences, and most especially, to see where a common attitude can lead us to fall for unwarranted assumptions or misleading values. So I’m slightly irked in that I never really noticed this post topic until recently, but at the very least it appears I’m not alone (is there a good reason to take comfort in that?) In the time that I’ve had it in draft form, I’ve come up with numerous aspects to add to it, and will likely discover more now after I’ve published it, but this is enough of a start.

I’ll be blunt: I am astounded at how incredibly selfish most religion is. It is a near-constant litany of how any individual’s status is determined and maintained, frequently at the expense of others, and it is incredibly anti-social. There, now that I put every religious person firmly on the defensive, they won’t be reading any further, and I can put anything I want from here on in. Yet I’m perfectly serious, so if you’re curious (or up to the challenge,) keep reading.

Miss me?

Al Denelsbeck


Probably not. I really shouldn’t ask questions like that.

In winding down this evening (well, yesterday evening now,) I noticed that a lot of my favorite bloggers have nothing new to post, with good reason. They’re all at the Reason Rally in DC, most of them probably starting to get a bit bleary and manic from the long day and the after-rally get-togethers as I type this (it’s 1:00 am Sunday morning.) I would have liked to have been there, but I had already committed to teaching a seminar on Spring Garden Photography for the local botanical garden by the time I realized how cool the Reason Rally was going to be. I guiltily admit that a small part of me was hoping for something to happen and reschedule the seminar, so I could do both, but I honestly can’t complain. It looked like DC got some pretty heavy rain storms today, and while we did too, we got a fortuitous break in the weather at the time that we all left the education center to go chase pics in the garden. The clouds were widely variable, so we actually got bright sunlight and blue skies, partial clouds, and full overcast all in the space of 90 minutes, but no rain. There was a pretty good turnout, and everyone seemed pleased with the seminar – one attendee was kind enough to tell me I was a natural teacher, which was great to hear (and repeat.) I also want to take this opportunity to thank Nik for his assistance with pointers in the garden session, and of course, I owe a lot to the North Carolina Botanical Garden. While details are not firmed up yet, it appears I will be doing a children’s photography workshop in the summer there, too.

The nasty throat infection that I got early in the week had mostly cleared by this afternoon, so I was able to speak, but that had remained iffy for several days, and it definitely slowed down my writing activity. I’ve learned that if I’m not in a decent mood for writing, pushing it doesn’t accomplish anything, and I should just scribble down some basic thoughts and come back to it when the words are flowing better. That’s part of the reason why a new topic this week hasn’t been tackled until now.



You will (of course!) remember about this time last year when I watched the red-shouldered hawks (Buteo lineatus) cavorting (or canoodling) nearby and hoped to find the nest; this did not come to pass. To make up for this, because they obviously saw how disappointed I was, the local pair this year took up residence in the neighbor’s tree, within easy sight from our back yard, front yard, and even the road, and it appears that I’ll still have a nice break in the foliage once the trees are fully leafed out, so I won’t lose sight of them. The female is currently spending a lot of time in the nest and may soon deposit the eggs – I don’t think they’ve been laid yet since they pair were doing the old flap-and-squawk a few days ago, several times. Newlyweds.

This is possibly even more fortuitous than it could have been, since the house next door that sits right under their nest (the same one that hosted our new editions to the household) has now been put up for sale, and so will likely remain unoccupied and quiet throughout the hatching and fledging period. There is even a chance that a nearby tree will be sufficient to provide a higher vantage point for photographing the nest, since it sports numerous branches at decent spacing.

I have been paying attention to the reactions of the pair to my presence, since they can see me far more easily than I can see them, and I’m concerned about them getting too spooked by humans nearby and abandoning the nest. Apparently, just to show that I’m being irrationally condescending about their timidity, the other day the male alighted in a tree in our backyard during his daily territorial patrols, and gave voice to some wonderfully piercing calls. My actions of slipping out the back door and firing off several frames with the 170-500mm lens disturbed him not a bit, despite the fact that I was roughly 15 meters away – he’s seen me too many times before, I guess. Red-shouldered hawks are among the noisiest of raptors, at least around here, because they soar about the perimeter of their territory a few times a day and issue a series of cries that are very distinct and carry no small distance. I’ve been in phone conversations and had people on the other end remark about the noise – it would probably help if I didn’t wander outside so often when I’m on the phone. If I manage to record these at some point (the hawk calls, not my phone conversations,) I’ll upload them to the site.

Nest weekend brings us the Rock Beyond Belief event at Ft Bragg, which should also be well worth attending. I had planned to be there, but I don’t think I’m going to have available transportation that day, so right now this is up in the air. I am more than happy to carpool and split costs with anyone who’s leaving from the Chapel Hill/Durham/Raleigh area, so get in touch! I promise to keep the critter stories to a minimum, unless you like them.


If you can read this…

Al Denelsbeck

First off, your assignment for today: read the post found at The Diamond In The Window – it shouldn’t take five minutes. I’ll wait here and chase the cat off the keyboard.

oiuc3uvcdugfybel,,l

Done? Good. That was a great example of how too many school systems within the US have completely lost sight of their goals, and most especially, a demonstration of the issues with “teaching to the test.” I have no problems with saying that what I learned in English classes in school has virtually nothing to do with how I write, nor what I present here. I always did well in English class, and have been an avid reader since before I started school. But in my years of school, there was one book, just one, assigned in class that I actually enjoyed: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. On the flip side, I am completely lost as to why anyone would bother with F. Scott Fitzgerald or John Knowles, not terribly impressed with William Shakespeare or Ernest Hemingway, and think John Steinbeck was a ham-fisted amateur at tragedy.

At this point, English majors and those who think the word “literature” is a mark of esteem would all be preparing to rip my writing apart in retaliation (presuming they had not already fled in horror long ago,) or at the very least assuring themselves that I’m certainly not sophisticated enough to understand such magnificent works. Never realizing, perhaps, that there is nothing that will be considered good by everyone, and such labels are merely expressions of opinion. The Appreciation of Literature is not something that we should aspire to, anymore than we should all have the same opinions of politicians, food, or hobbies; writing is about communication. If I’m completely put off by unrealistic depictions of human interactions, or obvious attempts to instill certain emotional responses, then that author is not communicating effectively to me. This is no more a fault of mine than it is of theirs.

I cannot, in the slightest, diagram a sentence anymore, and I haven’t ever regretted this in my life. I occasionally misuse words (perhaps even words like “occasionally,”) and could certainly write a bit clearer at times. But if anyone gets the gist of what I’m saying, and can read through without wincing in pain or getting confused, then I’ve done everything that writing is intended to do. If, by some infinitesimal chance, I manage to produce something that someone enjoys reading, that strikes their fancy or resonates or illustrates or enlightens, then I’ve gone beyond communication. That would be great, because that’s what makes people want to keep reading.

The authors that I like – Terry Pratchett and Brian Daley, Isaac Asimov and Douglas Adams and Gerald Durrell – are nearly all dead the ones responsible for how I write… because what they wrote is interesting, compelling, and entertaining. Sentence structure and the flow of prose do not come from classes, workshops, diagrams, and anal retentiveness, but from frequent exposure. None of the writers above will be considered within the realms of high literature, but if their writing keeps the reader involved, what more should anyone demand? Most importantly, why should anyone try to develop a ‘taste’ for writing based on what someone else deems worthy? Isn’t that simply sucking up to a perceived superiority?

‘Teaching’ and ‘learning’ are two concepts that are, far too often, poorly understood. Learning isn’t a special activity, nor does it take concerted effort. Humans learn as a matter of course, and we’re eager for new, interesting experiences. What we perceive through our senses is automatically stored in our brains – if we have reason to attach significance to it. Teaching is presenting information in a way that helps instill the significance, yet even saying that gives the wrong impression, I suspect. Significance isn’t fostered by putting more emphasis on certain words, or repeating things, but by tying the information into something that stirs an emotional response from the student, whether it be the sudden realization of how this applies to some aspect of their lives, or the discovery that a writer was sneaking in a hint of things to come, or simply that it came through a humorous method. You can’t diagram or structure a good teacher – nor can you judge a teacher by any particular student. Someone that reaches one student extraordinarily well may not reach another, because students are not blank slates cut from the same mold, but individuals with their own personalities.

In this way, I’m not going to agree with some of the comments on that linked post, the ones in essence saying, “Let the teachers teach.” Some teachers simply aren’t very good, and there really does need to be a way of determining such. But we’ve gotten immersed in a pile of standards within this country that now have little relation to anything useful for students. ‘Proper English’ is a completely misleading phrase, because there is no such thing. Language is simply effective communication, and it changes constantly. Nor is there any reason to maintain strict rules about it. The main reason I dislike Shakespeare is that the language has changed so much that his carefully-crafted passages, relying on the structure of the times, needs translation into current terms, changing the activity from following a storyline into building an edifice of context. An offhand double-entendre requires five minutes of explanation; everyone knows that explaining a joke takes every last vestige of humor from it.

Never, ever make reading (or any aspect of learning) a chore – that’s what we call a negative influence. Don’t over-analyze books or language. The term “prepositional phrase” is a sign of having too much time on your hands. Let the kids find the emotional response, the identification, the surprise of lost time because the book is too damn interesting to put down. And this will be different for every kid, and should be. When the student, on their own, starts on the next book from the same author, that’s your criteria of success.

And a hint to anyone who is called upon to administer testing and school curricula: teaching, good teaching, is not just technical, but emotional as well. Not everyone who can do a particular task can supervise others for the same task, and not everyone who knows the material can teach. What’s needed is someone who can produce the enthusiasm and spark the interest in their students, and a lot of that comes from possessing the same traits themselves. Crush that by trying to quantify it in some statistical manner, and you effectively stop someone from actually being a teacher. Or simply think back on the teachers that you preferred, and what classes you remember most. You might also think back on the jobs you yourself have held where the pay was inadequate; were you a good performer then? Did the employers who were micro-managers and clock-watchers produce a better workforce? Were you enthusiastic about going to work each day? Because, for someone to spark the enthusiasm in a student, they need to be enthusiastic themselves. Shit pay and the Sword of Damocles overhead is exactly the opposite of what’s needed.

Granted, most of our political parties benefit from a populace dumber than a bag of lint, which might explain many current trends in our overall educational system, but that’s another post…

Not quite over it yet

Al Denelsbeck


I know this is a poor showing for National Wildlife Week, but hey, I think every week is National Wildlife Week, so chill. I been busy.

Anyway, in poking around today after staging a few shots for a presentation, I came across this little lovely, in a very typical place for such: on a rock, in a cranny sheltered by a clump of leaves. This is a southern black widow (Lactrodectus mactans) almost certainly a juvenile. When hatched, they are rusty orange with rows of dots on the backs of their abdomens, and none of the classic markings that we usually associate with widows. As they get older, they gradually change colors, becoming more glossy black and developing red markings – the classic hourglass on the underside of the abdomen, and often a row of dots or markings down the “spine.” I suspect this one is a male, but I’m not sure about that; the coloration of the legs and the larger pedipalps seems to indicate such, but I didn’t think they possessed the globular abdomen like the females do. All the entomologists reading can weigh in if they like. I did get a good look at the hourglass marking later on, which makes me confident this is the southern variant, since the marking was not separated in the middle as the northern variants display – yes, they overlap territory seriously, and both actually inhabit the entire east coast. I apologize for not having clearer pics, but I hadn’t attached a flash yet and was working with natural light. When I returned a couple minutes later with the flash, my subject had taken a powder.

That’s typical, too. Despite the potency of their venom, black widows are actually quite shy, nearly reclusive you might say (sorry,) and seek shelter almost immediately upon danger threatening. This one was kind enough to hold still for several frames, including the scale illustration below, before ducking out of sight again.

Now, I grew up arachnophobic, I’m not really sure why, and have made efforts to get over it, because spiders are cool macro subjects, and ubiquitous – I saw three different species in the immediate vicinity while shooting this one. I can handle most of the smaller ones, and actually like the various jumping spiders, even though my first memorable experience with spiders was with a jumper that I was convinced was a black widow instead [I removed a plastic protective cap from my backyard slide set one day when I was five or so, and a good-sized jumping spider leapt out and posed dramatically, hazzah! Since I had no idea what black widows really looked like, I figured the bigger and hairier, the more dangerous, not to mention only mean spiders would jump out like that; I screamed and slid down the slide simultaneously, and didn’t go back for days.]

I have gotten past that almost completely, enough to put my finger practically on this spider’s leg for comparison. Almost. My flash unit has a zoom head, a motorized mechanism within that adjusts the illumination distance for whatever focal length I’m using; also, the camera itself times out and shuts off after a few minutes. While poking around trying to find my subject again for better shots with the flash, the camera timed out and shut itself off, and the flash head reset with an audible bzzzt! – while sitting directly under my chin. Yes, I jumped. Not completely over it yet…

But that’s different!

Al Denelsbeck

To everyone reading this right now, kindly send me your Social Security number. I am a taxpayer, and I help pay to support this program, so you need to send it to me so that I may confirm that your own contributions are in order. I have no intention of carrying more than my share of the burden while you remain off of the grid, shrouded in privacy.

I also need to know what car you drive; make, model, color, and Vehicle Identification Number. You are on public roads, so this is my right to know. In fact, I really need to know what it is you do in your car, because this impacts everyone else. Most especially how often you play with that little Star Trek Tricorder of yours instead of paying attention to the road. I also need to know if your driving habits are contributing unnecessarily to the depletion of fossil fuels. If you drove an SUV into work with only yourself inside, this is a serious problem that must be resolved, for the sake of everyone.

I need to know what kind of eating habits you have, because this ultimately impacts the cost of health care in this country, and can contribute to the decline in life expectancy and even influences children in their developing years. I’m not very happy with those who publicly eat junk food where kids can see them, even if they don’t appear to be enjoying it. Waste products from food packaging also forms the majority of the bulk in our landfills, which affects everybody, so it’s important to know who isn’t doing their part in reducing waste.

I need to know whether you’ve been to counseling of any kind, and how your past relationships have gone – this requires corroborating info from family members, former spouses, and everyone you’ve dated. A very large number of the crimes in this country are committed by people with some shitty pasts, so this is for everyone’s safety. If you don’t want to answer, that’s fine, but you do realize this means you simply have something to hide, right?

I need to see the past seven years of your employment performance evaluations. Productivity in this country is a major contributor to its economic status, and in these tough times, we need to know who’s pulling their weight and who isn’t. Naturally, this also means a good record of your usage of company resources, especially computer and corporate vehicles. I will probably need to install some monitoring devices wherever you work. This is not your own time, after all. Remember, as a taxpayer, my curiosity must influence you since you’re benefiting from my dime, even when you’re contributing your own. Your taxes don’t count in this regard.

What you watch on TV, and the movies you select to view, are of paramount importance. You are potentially a voter, now or in future, and we cannot have effective leadership if the voters in this country are ill-informed. There is also the possibility that violent movies lead to violent behavior, as well as patriotic movies leading to bad foreign relations – since this makes perfect sense, I’m not obligated to actually support this with any kind of facts. Common knowledge is dependable knowledge. If I can draw a connection, it must logically exist.

While I’m on the subject of voters, who did you vote for in the last dozen elections? If they achieved office and made bad decisions, this means that you led us all in a downward direction, and perhaps we need to be looking at voter privileges a little closer. Responsibility is something that should be both earned and sustained.

Are any of your children struggling with school, or maintaining less than an optimum grade? This likely means you’re not a very good parent, and someone should be stepping in. I also need to see what entertainment materials you’re choosing for your offspring. We all know where an abundance of stupid kids leads: YouTube server overloads, and dumber advertisements on MTV. Everyone has to deal with these, you know, not just your own little brats.

I am saying all of this because I am smarter and more moral than you, and you need the guidance. You cannot be trusted to cross the street on your own. Those of us who have learned how to make simple decisions have a responsibility to protect ourselves from abject morons, and to be frank, the morons should be grateful to be controlled. Where would we be if we allowed people to give in to their desires, rather than letting someone else make rational decisions for them?

However, who you go to bed with, what you do when you get there, and how you deal with any consequences… that’s all none of my fucking business. It’s a free country, after all.

Macro photography, part three

Al Denelsbeck

I threatened earlier to return to this if you weren’t good, so you only have yourself to blame, but herewith, a quick tutorial on a method of macro photography called dark field photography.

Most times, this is used with microscopic subjects, which technically isn’t macro photography but photomicrography instead. The essence is, the visible background of the image is dark, yet the subject is backlit to shine light through the body and show very fine details. This is accomplished by using an oblique light source, which avoids shining light directly into the lens. For macro photography, this is very useful for small subjects, especially aquatic. It doesn’t require a microscope, but does require either a kickass macro lens, or using one of the varieties of high magnification tricks:

* Bellows – Essentially a long and highly adjustable extension tube. When you move a lens further away from the camera body, it magnifies the image on the film plane just as moving a projector further from the screen enlarges the projected image. Bellows can be used with a variety of lenses for different magnifications and effect, but usually require manually closing the lens aperture since there is rarely any connecting apparatus between camera and lens;

* Lens reversal – A wide angle lens can be mounted on the camera backwards, usually with an inexpensive adapter, providing significant magnification. This usually eliminates any aperture control whatsoever, unless you use a lens that lets you set aperture manually;

* Lens stacking – This means putting a shorter lens, such as a 50mm, reversed onto the end of a telephoto, also producing very high magnification. A tele zoom is recommended just for a bit more versatility, allowing the zoom adjustment to stand in for focusing – otherwise focus is largely achieved by moving the camera forward and back, because the standard lens focus becomes almost ineffective with stacking. Both lenses should be very sharp examples, by the way, because aberrations are compounded with stacking;

Now, here’s the rig:

“A” is the camera and lens setup, in this case a bellows and 50mm enlarger lens. It is highly recommended that this all be mounted on a slider of some kind to allow the camera to move closer to and further from your subject stage, which is how gross focus is achieved at such high magnifications. Here, I took pains to get the camera and stage at a height to make it easier to use from a chair, avoiding other pains such as a badly stiff back and neck from crouching. Learn from my trials.

“B” is the stage itself, a basic drinking glass. In the bottom sits a small piece of black cloth; in the top is lodged (perfectly level) a lens filter. Anything reasonably clear will work – mine is an old UV filter. Essentially, it’s a clear support for your subject, and for aquatic subjects it’s a shallow pool. Many filters aren’t perfectly watertight, so adding a little wax, petroleum jelly, or caulk to the underside edges will help prevent draining. All of this is placed on something to get it close enough to the camera to be in focus range, and for preference on a surface that allows sliding the glass sideways smoothly, which is much easier than moving the camera as your subject moves to a new location.

“C” is your camera strobe/flash, aimed upwards at a 45 degree angle or so through the bottom of the filter. The goal is for the light to hit the subject, but be aimed well away from your camera lens. While you can link this to your camera with a TTL cord seen here, this can also be triggered with a radio slave, optical slave, or even by hand if necessary. A strobe with manual power output is much more versatile, but you can adjust light on even a cheap strobe with white plastic bag diffusers, angling it slightly away from the subject, or by adjusting the distance of the strobe from the subject. Bear in mind that you’re probably going to be working at small apertures to force depth of field as high as possible, so a lot of light output is often necessary.

“D” is a strong light source so you can actually see to focus, since most of the lens options will reduce light significantly. With such a close subject and/or small volume of water, the light can heat up your subject to an unhealthy degree, so keep it as far as you can to still allow enough light to focus, and swap out your subjects and water frequently.

Also seen is the eyedropper used to fill the filter with water, as needed, and wrangle your subjects to the stage. With most tiny aquatic subjects, only a millimeter or three of water is sufficient for them to swim around happily, and will prevent them from going ‘deep’ and out of focus range. In essence, you’ve produced only two dimensions of movement (which still can be enormously frustrating, given the tiny view angle you’ll probably have, but much less frustrating than three dimensions.) It helps a lot to have some bit of debris or whatever in the water at the same depth/distance as your subjects, so you have something to do focus and light tests on that isn’t moving, and in fact a few of them provide visual cues as to just where you’re aiming when your subject starts going walkabout across the stage.

So, how does it work?

Fairly well I think, considering that nothing I used was designed to accomplish this. This is a daphnia, an aquatic microorganism that fits into the overarching term of “plankton,” but if you want more of a description than that I’ll urge you to use that link. This one is fairly large as my captured examples go, meaning the total body length spans about the size of a pinhead. I had several within the rig, and this one paused long enough in its mad perambulations for me to focus. The antlers are antennae that serve double-duty as swimming appendages, and yes, that’s an eye visible. I’m guessing that’s an intestinal tract and not a walking cane carried internally, but seriously, I just take pictures; someone else can expound on the anatomy.

The dark field method tends to give great views of anatomy and internal structure, though it is faintly misleading in helping someone spot one of these on their own, since it uses transmitted light and not reflected. Daphnia and copepods usually appear very pale brown in color, and little more than ovals, but they’re easy to obtain – I have zillions in the tank right now. I also, without trying, had snagged up some snails eggs that had detached from their adhesive sac, so these went onto the dark field glass too. If you want to have fun, show this picture to someone (preferably female) and see if their reaction changes when you tell them these are baby snails not long before hatching.


Aren’t they adorable? Yes, two of them are facing the camera (though I’m not too sure about smiling) and one is in profile – those are indeed eyespots. The diameter of the entire egg is roughly that of a straight pin shaft. Note how the light angle gives nice definition, if not a three-dimensional effect, to the transparent eggshells, and I have an even better one coming. Granted, less schmutz in the water is desired, but it’s hard to filter the water without screening out all the little cuties living within.

Setting up such a photography rig is a little fussy, requiring a small devotion of time, but it’s hardly elaborate – I’ve done setups, a collection of frames on multiple subjects, and tore it all back down again within an hour. The tripod is the key – effective focus is a very tiny range, a few millimeters at best, and even going to minimum aperture doesn’t change this much, so you’ll want a camera support that doesn’t twitch or settle at all. You’ll also want to get in the habit of not touching the camera except when absolutely necessary, and then doing so gingerly.

As for lens choices, that really depends on what you can lay your hands on. I’ve used the bellows with a screw-mount Vivitar 135mm that I purchased for $25, an Argus Cintar 50mm, and a cheapo Omega 50mm enlarger lens. I have also done a combination extension tube and lens reversal. Since the bellows had come with Nikon lens adapters, the latter two lenses were mounted to Nikon body caps, drilled out to the right size to admit their mounting rings (Dremels are wonderful things.) Getting the lenses mounted perfectly centered isn’t absolutely necessary, since shifting a lens slightly to one side only shifts the image in the opposite direction – that’s how image stabilization lenses work, as well as perspective-control lenses – but having them mounted flush is important. Lenses are optimized towards a flat plane projection surface, the digital sensor or film, and having them tilted slightly will reduce depth of field, not something you can afford to do with macro work. These pics here, by the way, were with the enlarger lens.

You can also do dark field work directly through the side of an aquarium, camera mounted horizontally like normal rather than vertically as shown above, but this reduces your flexibility a bit. First off, you’ll be waiting for your subject to hold still against the glass, or choosing a fixed subject (no, you’re not going to nail a free-floating subject with magnification this high, and you’ll die of apoplexy trying.) You typically have to move the camera every time the subject shifts, and with focus this short it often takes a couple of minutes to get everything back sharp – or even find it! And the sides of the tank introduce more distortion than simply shooting through the top surface of a film of water – a lot more, if they’re plastic and in rough shape.

Here, I picked one of the egg sacs on the glass, catching the snails in the process of hatching. The soap-bubble-like diffraction shows empty eggshells, and you can see several fully-hatched snails, and one (center bottom) in the process of freeing itself. The flash is aimed through the top of the tank towards the back of the tank side, and coming at this oblique angle, with settings of f16 at 1/200 second, the rest of the tank went too dark to show in the background. I’d polished the scratched sides right over the egg sac (Dremels are wonderful things) so I’d have a better surface to shoot through.

Unlike the image below, where two egg-bearing copepods paused, with remarkable cooperation, right smack alongside one another long enough for me to move the rig and get some nice detail shots. The horrible condition of the sides is what produced the streaks, yet I still managed to get the image sharp enough to show more than a little internal detail. Notice the difference, however, in the resolution of the antennae versus the eggs, most especially of the one to the left. That’s simply a result of the eggs being a different distance from the lens than the antennae, and the very short depth of high magnification was enough to throw them out of sharp focus, even though we’re talking fractions of a millimeter.


So, put it all together and take a shot at it. It’s definitely very cool to see the details of something barely visible to the unassisted eye. Have fun!

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