Dance of a Moth

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Ganesh H Shankar
Dance of a Moth
Just back from a week long photography at a remote village near foot hills of Western Ghats. Days were very hectic as I was making images during both day and night. Made this one at night using a camera trap. Not sure whether I can completely say I *made* this since I did not visualize this perticular pattern before. I wired a camera trap and a couple of flahes with a stroboscopic flash effect to trace the motion like this. So this is one moth not three. When it comes to unmanned images like this we try imaging certain kinds of frames/composition and leave the rest to God. Some times you get lucky..
Sun Oct 17, 2010 10:01 am
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Ganesh H. Shankar
Wishing you best light,

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Fine Art Nature Photography


Ganesh H Shankar  Joined CNP On 24 Apr 2008    Total Image posts 973    -   Total Image Comments 7874    -   Image Post to Comment Ratio 1:8    -   Image Comment Density 38     -     Total Forum Posts 956

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Commentby kiran_sham on Sun Oct 17, 2010 12:34 pm

I was so waiting for this one... The light is just fabulous and the exposure is spot on, as always :)

Commentby Ganesh H Shankar on Sun Oct 17, 2010 12:46 pm

Thanks Kiran ! And for all the help... By the time I got some grip on the light it was time to get back home. Anyway.. miles to go...

--
Ganesh H. Shankar
Wishing you best light,

Image
Fine Art Nature Photography

Commentby Shivakumar L Narayan on Sun Oct 17, 2010 1:22 pm

For now - no words to describe what am feeling seeing this image ... i was just guessing you could be doing something related to remote or strobe photography during this trip and I was not wrong :)
I understand your views when you say "Not sure whether I can completely say I *made* this since I did not visualize this perticular pattern before." - but it has your signature all around it.
This is just awesome to core.

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Shiv | +91 97390 36563 | www.shivakumar.net | twitter | facebook | instagram | youtube

Commentby Prithvi K on Sun Oct 17, 2010 7:31 pm

Amazing shot sir, I hear drum beats when I look at this image.
Coud you please explain the technique a bit more in detail "stroboscopic flash effect to trace the motion like this"

Commentby Ganesh H Shankar on Sun Oct 17, 2010 7:51 pm

Prithvi, some of the flashes (typically higher end ones) supports stroboscopic effect - that is flash can be programmed to trigger multiple times during a single exposure. The frequency and number of exposures can be controlled. In this case I used two of them in stroboscopic mode, one as a master and another as a slave. Hope this helps..

--
Ganesh H. Shankar
Wishing you best light,

Image
Fine Art Nature Photography

Commentby Nilanjan Das on Sun Oct 17, 2010 9:31 pm

Ultimate creativity. Not possible to exactly imagine such images but the idea which led to making of this is just outstanding. Too many questions in my mind actually :), but I would let them go for the time being and just watch and enjoy the image here.

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Nilanjan Das Photography

Commentby Pramod Viswanath on Sun Oct 17, 2010 10:35 pm

This is fantastic image Ganesh. I just love the depth that is created in this image because of variety of orientations of 3 different moths. Tinge of blueish-black contrasts so well against the other moth on the top whose posterior portion is completely lit. Mindblowing work!

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Pramod Viswanath
Frames from wild | My Blog
Our only limitation is imagination !

Commentby Ashwini Kumar Bhat on Mon Oct 18, 2010 9:59 am

This is an amazing image Ganesh! Congrats for that. You constantly raise the bars ...all the time! The positions of the moth in the frame is making it more interesting. The exposure is also spot on. Thanks for sharing these images and for constant inspiration.

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Cheers,
Ashwini Kumar Bhat
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My scribblings | My Portfolio

Commentby Madhav Jois on Mon Oct 18, 2010 10:49 am

Dear Ganesh,

Your images are like light houses, always there to guide ships (souls) lost in perpetual darkness. It’s a privilege to see and comment on this image.

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Best Regards,
Madhav
My Gallery

Commentby Santosh Saligram on Mon Oct 18, 2010 11:29 am

Truly inspirational imagery! The skill, discipline, visualization and logistical hard work required to pull off something like this are enormous, as I can imagine.

As I see it, the only thing that can better this high-impact image is probably slightly better definition (in terms of sharpness and colour) of the golden wing outlines of the two background images of the moth and perhaps a wee bit more sharpening overall (unless it's my monitor in both cases). Also, again maybe it's because this monitor is not calibrated, but the border seems to merge with the image, thus annulling its purpose. Kindly do consider a lighter one.

Thanks for sharing this piece of brilliance, Ganesh. I look forward to more from your signature trip. :-)



» Last edited by Santosh Saligram on Mon Oct 18, 2010 11:29 am; edited 1 time in total

Commentby Ganesh H Shankar on Mon Oct 18, 2010 12:54 pm

You are right about the slightly better definition Santhosh. Getting perfect focus is a challenge when we don't have our eyes behind the view finder. I used some mathematics for getting optimal focus but some of these random movements belongs to statistics (not maths) :) Wings merging with BG on your display
could be a calibration issue.

--
Ganesh H. Shankar
Wishing you best light,

Image
Fine Art Nature Photography

Commentby Santosh Saligram on Mon Oct 18, 2010 1:23 pm

Hi Ganesh, thanks for the quick response!
Actually, the wings don't merge with the background on my display. By "better definition", I meant perhaps some more sharpness and saturation of the golden border of the wings. :-)

The merging problem I expressed was that of the border of the canvas with the rest of the image. :-) Is there enough difference in shade between the border and the image on your calibrated display?



» Last edited by Santosh Saligram on Mon Oct 18, 2010 1:56 pm; edited 2 times in total

Commentby Sriharsha Ganjam on Mon Oct 18, 2010 6:06 pm

I love this Ganesh! Perfect exposure, and I love the colors on this. If it has to be done right it has to be from you. Can you tell the exposure time for this if you don't mind, given the fact that the moth took a certain time to fly into these 3 spots and the time difference between the three flash bursts?

Commentby Ganesh H Shankar on Mon Oct 18, 2010 6:51 pm

Santhosh, on my laptop which is uncalibrated the border appears faint seem to merge with the black bg. On my calibrated display it gets clear separated from the black bg.

Harsha, the exposure used for this is 1 second (yes 1 second) and I fired the flashes at 8 Hz.

--
Ganesh H. Shankar
Wishing you best light,

Image
Fine Art Nature Photography

Commentby Abhisek Majumdar on Tue Oct 19, 2010 9:59 am

An absolute visual delight!! Hats off to the eyes sir which imagined the possibility of seeing something as spectacular as this!!