Dave Nicholl

A close encounter with a damselfly yields a highly successful shot

Dave says : I went for a walk along the river, knowing there were lots of banded damselfly about and they’d be getting ready to rest for the night among the reeds.

I sat in some long grass watching them for a while, and noticed when this one landed on a flower head near to me.

Being approximately five metres away, I knew that using my Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 12-100mm lens at 100mm would throw the background right out of focus, so I concentrated on focusing on the insect’s head and managed to take several frames before it disappeared. My exposure was 1/250 sec at f/7 and ISO 400.

Andrew says : I absolutely love banded damsels – they are so beautiful and plentiful during the summer months along many streams and rivers.

Before I even get to the image, Dave, I like the fact that you sat and watched them first to see what they were doing and where they were resting. Your patience paid off with this one nestling close by. I think that is often the best approach with flying insects: wait for them to come to you. You’ve done well to get your AF locking onto the front eyes, and the f/7 aperture has given you a little bit of sharpness from the front of the head and along the thorax. The evening light that’s just touching the top of the flower head and the insect itself really helps to separate the subject from the background. The background is nicely diffused so there are few distractions. I think I might have been tempted to include a little bit more of its perch, but it’s still a very good shot.

“The evening light that’s touching the flower head and the insect really helps to separate the subject from the background”