Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Images of undisturbed subjects in their natural environment. All subject types.

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MarkSturtevant
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Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by MarkSturtevant »

Here are pictures taken with the inexpensive Opteka wide angle macro lens.

European mantis, Mantis religiosa.
ImageMantis. Wide angle macro by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
ImagePreying mantis. Wide angle macro by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr

Chinese mantis, Tenodera sinensis. I found this small field that had these monsters everywhere! I would be photographing one and then I'd see 2 ... 3... no 4 more nearby! Incredible.
ImageChinese mantis Wide angle macro by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
ImageChinese mantis wide angle macro by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr

Sometimes the Chinese mantis comes in a green form, like this lovely lady. Although she looks like the above European mantis, this one could eat that one for a lunch!
ImageChinese mantis wide angle macro by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr

Here is a crop of the previous picture. Zoom in to see that this inexpensive lens is pretty sharp!
ImageChinese mantis by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr

Wide angle macro is easiest with things that sit still.
ImageMushrooms by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr
ImageMushroom wide angle macro by Mark Sturtevant, on Flickr

Thanks for looking!
Last edited by MarkSturtevant on Wed Jul 27, 2022 8:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
Mark Sturtevant
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rjlittlefield
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Re: Wide angle macro lens pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by rjlittlefield »

Lovely!

I did a Google search on Opteka wide angle macro lens and several possibilities turned up.

For clarity, can you provide a link to the exact lens model that you used? Thanks!

--Rik

MarkSturtevant
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Re: Wide angle macro lens pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by MarkSturtevant »

rjlittlefield wrote:
Wed Jul 27, 2022 7:57 am
Lovely!
I did a Google search on Opteka wide angle macro lens and several possibilities turned up.
For clarity, can you provide a link to the exact lens model that you used? Thanks!
--Rik
Thank you! Here is a link from their web site: https://opteka.com/products/opteka022346. Mine is for the Canon EOS mount, but I have not seen that online lately and I don't know why. The price has gone up a bit, but its still a bargain compared to the Venus/Laowa model which has essentially the same specs, except the latter lens has a 'shift' mechanism at the base to correct for perspective.
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by rjlittlefield »

Thanks for the link. I wondered if that was the one. I saw that you had used a Canon camera, and I mostly use Canon, so I looked for the lens in Canon mount and failed out also. I notice at the bottom of that page that a couple of their other lenses are marked as "SOLD OUT". I wonder if they are having manufacturing issues, or perhaps don't sell enough of these to make it worth their while to keep making them.

--Rik

hayath
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by hayath »

Fascinating perspectives and images!
Makes me wanna give that lens a try sometime soon

MarkSturtevant
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by MarkSturtevant »

rjlittlefield wrote:
Wed Jul 27, 2022 9:00 am
Thanks for the link. I wondered if that was the one. I saw that you had used a Canon camera, and I mostly use Canon, so I looked for the lens in Canon mount and failed out also. I notice at the bottom of that page that a couple of their other lenses are marked as "SOLD OUT". I wonder if they are having manufacturing issues, or perhaps don't sell enough of these to make it worth their while to keep making them.
--Rik
I haven't turned up a Canon copy either. Of course Thomas Shahan describes the Venus/Laowa model (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmFmgFNrmac) before the Opteka clone came out. He describes other options for getting this sort of lens.
Allan Walls describes this variety of photography here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmFmgFNrmac. and he says that a very short focal length wide angle lens can be converted toward being a wide angle close up lens with a very short extension tube. An advantage there could be that one could have electronic aperture, which I don't get to have. So if you have a 15mm-ish lens laying around ...
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vinceparadise
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by vinceparadise »

Cool pics, thanks for sharing. I saw a wide angle macro shot of a snail on a rail track a few months ago. It looked a cool image and wanted to get myself a wide angle macro lens, I'll have a look at this one

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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by MarkSturtevant »

For those wishing to venture into this area: Be aware that this is not an easy lens! This is to prepare you.
1. Even at close up distances, as in the pictures shown here, the working distances become very short. Maybe an inch or less, even though it does not look like it. Toward 1:1, its more like a few millimeters. I can't use the viewfinder but must rely entirely on the LCD screen, which I don't normally do. If you have ever looked through binoculars in reverse, you will get some idea of what it looks like thru the viewfinder.
2. One challenge is getting light onto the subject under the shadow of the lens. I've been lately relying on my dual head flash where I can aim the heads straight down (and also up, when possible). These often then wind up being visible in the shot since the lens practically sees around corners. I then "photoshop" out the diffusers. You can't see them in these samples, but they were there!
3. Focus and compose wide open, using the live view mode + lcd screen magnfication + very long exposure time to get precise focus on the front-most thing you want. This does not work with a curious mantis so well, btw. Then, stop down the aperture to ~ f/32 to get the background in semi-focus (the appeal of wide angle macro being that you can see the landscape). Crank up shutter speed to something more reasonable. Shoot in the dark. Tweak shutter speed and flash power and ISO to get exposure on foreground and background. Trial and error for me!
4. Expect more than the usual amount of post-processing to balance out exposures that could not be achieved in the camera.
5. You will also discover the need to watch horizon lines. I'm still not used to that.

When you get pictures that are keepers, the feeling of accomplishment is well earned! I still say this is the most fun lens I own, but it takes patience and a sense of humor.
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AlP
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by AlP »

Nice pix Mark. I gather the mantids are not flighty. Sadly, no native mantids here.

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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by MarkSturtevant »

AlP wrote:
Thu Jul 28, 2022 5:57 am
Nice pix Mark. I gather the mantids are not flighty. Sadly, no native mantids here.
No native mantids here as well! Just the European and Chinese. In both, the males are fairly flighty and quite frankly are a pain in the rear to work with. But the females are gravid with eggs and so they don't fly.
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AlP
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by AlP »

No native mantids here as well! Just the European and Chinese.
I gather where you are (Michigan), the the European and Chinese mantids will survive a winter? I've only seen one mantid in my life in the wild in southern Ontario (late 1990's) near Brantford. Maybe it snuck into Canada from New York (winky eye).

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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by MarkSturtevant »

AlP wrote:
Fri Jul 29, 2022 5:34 am
I gather where you are (Michigan), the the European and Chinese mantids will survive a winter? I've only seen one mantid in my life in the wild in southern Ontario (late 1990's) near Brantford. Maybe it snuck into Canada from New York (winky eye).
We get significant cold periods, and there are bits of Canada that are south of where I am (weird when I realized that). Their oothecae overwinter here just fine, and we get periods of intense cold.
BugGuide lists several entries for the Chinese mantis in Ontario. I haven't checked iNaturalist. For BugGuide, you will need to register to access their location maps. Once registered, use the Login, do a search for the Chinese mantis, then click on the Data tab, and choose Ontario to see the entries. I find out where to look for all sorts of specific critters in BugGuide!
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AlP
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by AlP »

We get significant cold periods, and there are bits of Canada that are south of where I am (weird when I realized that). Their oothecae overwinter here just fine, and we get periods of intense cold.
BugGuide lists several entries for the Chinese mantis in Ontario. I haven't checked iNaturalist. For BugGuide, you will need to register to access their location maps. Once registered, use the Login, do a search for the Chinese mantis, then click on the Data tab, and choose Ontario to see the entries. I find out where to look for all sorts of specific critters in BugGuide!
Well, my chances of getting over there from here is slim at just over 2000 miles and that is the short route through the northern US. Ya, I've been on Bug Guide for a number of years. Apparently I got the very first Tipula pachyrhinoides post in Bug Guide as notified Wednesday for an image I did back in 2020.

dy5
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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by dy5 »

Lovely photos. Nice to get a sense of the animal in its habitat.

Thanks for the (daunting) details. I had wondered about the lighting. Seems like it would be difficult to match the exposure of the mantis and the background. Your flash seems to have done that quite well, although it can't have been very easy to get the balance between foreground and background.

We have plenty of mantises here in Maryland. Over the last several decades, the Chinese mantis has has become much more common than the native Carolina mantis (Stagmomantis carolina). I've never found a Mantis religiosa down here.

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Re: Wide angle macro pictures of mantids (mostly)

Post by MarkSturtevant »

dy5 wrote:
Sat Jul 30, 2022 4:51 am
Lovely photos. Nice to get a sense of the animal in its habitat.
Thanks for the (daunting) details. I had wondered about the lighting. Seems like it would be difficult to match the exposure of the mantis and the background. Your flash seems to have done that quite well, although it can't have been very easy to get the balance between foreground and background.
We have plenty of mantises here in Maryland. Over the last several decades, the Chinese mantis has has become much more common than the native Carolina mantis (Stagmomantis carolina). I've never found a Mantis religiosa down here.
Thank you. You see the problem with balancing the foreground versus background. I try different flash powers (foreground) and shutter speeds (background) until it seems about right. But in fact there are commonly still issues in the best ones, where this part is over-exposed, or the background trees are underexposed but that's what gets the blue sky the way I want. So that is where the extended post-processing comes in. One part of that will be to use layer masks to combine bits of different pictures --> a single picture. I don't know if this is what people who are really good at this photography need to do, but its commonly what I need to do.
We don't get the Carolina mantis here for some reason.
Mark Sturtevant
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