Close-Up Photographs Of a Dragonfly

Last night, I was presented with a dragonfly that seemed to be asleep. The person who presented me with the insect knew I was into photographing macro style, so they were eager to see what I could do.

I was eager too, but reality seemed to have had its way with me, which caused a few problems.

First, I was inside sitting at my desk. I didn’t have a tripod available, so I was forced to take the photos by hand. Second, the lighting was terrible, so I had to use a flashlight to get any sort of decent light. The flash on the camera was blocked by the end of the lens. This is because I held the lens only a few inches away from the dragonfly. I used my Hoya close-up lens filters which can easily cause this problem. Third, the dragonfly was filthy. It must have picked up some dust from the ground and fourth, what seemed, at first, to be a sleeping dragonfly turned into a wide awake dragonfly about half way through.

Needless to say, I didn’t get very good pictures. I’d like to post them here anyway, simply to recognize the effort that was used.