As an avid macro photographer, creating a small wild garden at home was one of the best decisions I ever made. As the space matured, it became a haven for insects and was always full of macro subjects. Having a location close to home that is reliable for photography means I can spend much more time outdoors, which increases the odds of achieving a picture to be proud of.
Macro photography, especially insect photography, can be challenging, but a macro lens is a ticket into a new world, one that is full of fascinating creatures, beautiful plants and fungi. The possibilities are endless because there are subjects to be found virtually anywhere.
Shield bugs are wonderful subjects to photograph because they are easy to spot, interesting to observe and require less magnification to fill the frame owing to their relatively large size. Equipped with my OM System OM-1 and 90mm macro lens, along with a diffused flash, I headed out to explore my garden in search of something cool to photograph.
The garden was alive with insects and birds, and just a few minutes into exploring I found this shield bug walking over some leaves. The image stabiliser in my OM-1 makes it possible to shoot handheld, which is very useful for exploring compositions with subjects that are prone to moving. I never remove insects from the wild, as pictures aren’t worth the risk of harming a living being, and for me, it’s better to rise to a challenge than to adopt bad practices.
After a few failed attempts at capturing an image, the shield bug eventually stopped at the end of a leaf for a short while. Shooting from a low level, I carefully composed a symmetrical, head-on image of the little critter and to my surprise, it suddenly began beating its wings, ready for lift off. Fortunately, it repeated this behaviour a few more times, allowing me to risk a focus stack.
With an aperture of f/7.1, the depth of field was very shallow, yet if I had closed the aperture, the background would have become sharper and the ambient light would have been reduced, creating a darker background, which on this occasion didn’t suit the shot I had in mind. To overcome this issue, I manually shot a sequence of eight images for a focus stack.
I began by manually focusing on the near side of the shield bug and then captured a series of images. After each picture I moved the camera forwards in small increments until the focal plane was on the wings. Then, without moving the camera away, I waited for a little while, hoping it would once again open its wings. It did, and with a great deal of luck I timed the shot so that the wings were open. Moments later, the shield bug was gone.