The Devil's Flower Mantis and his funky new L5 antennae!

[papilio_]

Idolomantis diabolica, L5 male














Thanks for looking!

 

[dmina]

Beautiful photo's Thanks for sharing!!!

Those antennae are magnificent...

Someday.. I will have me one of them... or two or ten... hehe

 

[aesculpius]

His horns are coming in nicely.

 

[Crazy4mantis]

how do you get the black background?

 

[LAME]

That's beautiful, superb photos friend!

personal favorites: #1 & #5

 

[papilio_]

Beautiful photo's Thanks for sharing!!!

Those antennae are magnificent...

Someday.. I will have me one of them... or two or ten... hehe

Thanks a lot dmina! I feel pretty lucky to be keeping a pair of these amazing creatures so early in my career.

His horns are coming in nicely.

Thanks aesculpius, they suddenly seemed to explode into view after the recent molt ... what a wild look!

how do you get the black background?

As long as there are no objects in the near background the strobe won't show them up much if at all ... if that's not possible, then a black velvet cloth is draped behind. The final look is then adjusted in post ... assuming it's fairly dark to begin with I just drop some more till it disappears. Typically I boost the exposure a bit and then drop the gamma curve waaay down, it can't be done by merely increasing contrast or the highlights will blow. Often though a hint of dark bokeh subtly showing up is nice for the sense of depth.

The simple answer , I guess, is that's just the way the images seem to end up when using a strobe unless I intentionally place some sort of background behind for a desired effect.

Actually, these particular images were pretty heavily back-lit, shooting with the light coming from about 45 degrees away from directly opposite the line of sight.

That's beautiful, superb photos friend!

personal favorites: #1 & #5

Many thanks LAME! :bow: Those are my faves too.

 

[sally]

The photos are fantastic!!

 

[papilio_]

Thanks very much sally!