In which I encounter a Privet hawk-moth
I had my moth trap out overnight yesterday. Not the best conditions, a bit cool, blustery and, judging by the ground, some overnight rain. Needless to say I ended up with only two moths in the trap, a Shuttle-shaped Dart, and a Heart and Dart.
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| Shuttle-shaped Dart |
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| Heart and Dart |
Neither spectacular and two I'd photographed before. Another early morning with minimal results. There's been a few of those recently as the weather's been a tad unkind.
Then yesterday evening I went out to water the plants and sitting on my hosepipe was a Privet Hawk-moth, Sphinx ligustri, a relatively common hawk-moth but one I'd never seen or photographed before. Watering could wait.
Out came my normal moth photography kit of OM-1, Olympus 60mm macro, and STF-8 twin flash, set to Manual exposure, 1/250 sec, and f8. The moth was very amenable to being moved around and posed (I use a feather to avoid any chance of accidental damage) and I got a few decent shots with the usual limitations of not quite enough depth of field.
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| Sphinx ligustri |
But the evening sun was shining so I decided to try some hand held focus stacking while I still had an amenable subject. The intention was to get some shots from different angles and still have most of the subject in focus. The soft evening light brought out the colour of this beautiful moth and, with the greater light intensity, allowed me to use the twin flash for fill in without the usual problem of not enough power to sustain continuous flashes in a focus stack.
I think it worked.
The moth was then released unharmed into the shelter of one of my palm trees
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