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Birdwing butterfly caterpillar
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Birdwing butterfly caterpillar



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A Cairns birdwing caterpillar in the process of suspending itself before forming a chrysalis. The Cairns birdwing butterfly is Australia's largest butterfl...
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A Cairns birdwing caterpillar in the process of suspending itself before forming a chrysalis. The Cairns birdwing butterfly is Australia's largest butterfly with a wingspan of up to 20cm's They lay their eggs on the 'dutchman's pipe vine on which the caterpillars will feed. Unfortunately, the female birdwing will also lay her eggs on another closely related species of vine introduced from South America. The caterpillars will feed on these leaves but will eventually die from the poison in the them
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upload_dateApr, 2016

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8 Comments |
ErrolFW
 
ErrolFW April 20, 2016
Welcome to Viewbug. Looking forward to more images like this. Well done!
Hood PRO+
 
Hood June 21, 2016
Congratulations!!!! Amazing capture. Way to go!
JohanLarson
JohanLarson November 20, 2016
Thank you very much!
bretthondow
 
bretthondow September 08, 2016
Probably the finest caterpillar shot I have ever seen! Did you focus stack for that great DoF?
JohanLarson
JohanLarson November 20, 2016
Thank you for your kind words! No I didn't focus stack it, I used plenty of light to be able to use a small aperture though.
FredBlundell
 
FredBlundell December 08, 2016
Superb artistry!
JohanLarson
JohanLarson April 17, 2017
Thank you very much Fred!
James_Francis
 
James_Francis March 26, 2017
Wow this is a amazing macro perfect lighting and colors
JohanLarson
JohanLarson April 17, 2017
Thank you so much James!
sheperson
 
sheperson June 05, 2017
Which camera/lens did you use?
JohanLarson
JohanLarson September 03, 2017
This shot was taken with a canon 50d and a canon 100mm macro
TMatt
 
TMatt June 06, 2017
Amazing!!!
JohanLarson
JohanLarson September 03, 2017
Thank you very much!
Julia_137
 
Julia_137 August 03, 2018
Great picture ! Come and check out a few of mine sometime 😃😄

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Tags

#Cairns #animal #australia #beautiful #birdwing #butterfly #caterpillar #insect #lifecycle #macro #metamorphosis #nature #queensland #tropical #tropics #wettropics #wildlife
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Behind The Lens

Location

I took this photo in Cairns, Queensland, Australia. I have the native vine on which the Cairns birdwing butterfly lay there eggs in in my backyard so I had a good supply of caterpillars at home :).

Time

The caterpillar started making the thread to attach itself with in the middle of the day and I snapped the photo in the afternoon just as it was about to 'crawl' through the hoop it had made.

Lighting

I used two flashes, one from the camera right and another for rim light from camera left behind the caterpillar.

Equipment

I used an old canon 50d with the canon 100mm macro 2.8 lens. Two yongnuo flashes with a yongnuo wireless trigger. The camersa was mounted on a Velbon tripod.

Inspiration

Macro photography opens up a whole new world of exciting nature. Something that from a distance looks plain and ordinary transforms into something amazing and extraordinary behind a macro lens. By getting close up to the birdwing butterflie caterpillar I was able to capture not just its beauty but also a little bit of it's amazing behaviour which I find makes a more interesting photo.

Editing

I shoot in RAW so post processing is always necessary. With this picture I only the the standard post processing required for RAW images, ie colours, curves, hue, black points and white points etc.

In my camera bag

I pretty much always carry my canon 100mm macro lens as it great for anything from macro to portraits, landscapes etc. most of the time I also carry my canon 300mm f4, canon 24-105mm and a couple of yongnuo flashes with triggers. Since I do a lot of photography at night I usually carry around a couple of good torches. Oh, and of course my camera, Just upgraded to a canon 6d.

Feedback

The great thing about macro photography is that you can find subjects almost anywhere! Look around your backyard, under leaves, in the ground, on tree trunks, you can almost always find something interesting. Once you have found an interwsting subject think about what angle will work, try a few different approaches until you are happy. Decide if you will use natural light or if you are going to light your subject, for macro photography I often tend to use flashes as it allows me to use a smaller aperture for greater depth of field and a faster shutterspeed to avoid camera shake or motion blur. If you are going to use a flash I strongly suggest that you start playing with using the flash off the camera. It makes the lighting more intersting by showing more texture and making the subject look more 3d. You can buy fairly cheap flashes and triggers and recievers that will do the trick, alternativel you could go for something like the canon macro twin flash unit. Again, experiment with lighting the subject from different angles to see what works the best, small changes can have a big impact on the final result!

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