Unknown bug stack (Whole bug shot added)

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lauriek
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Unknown bug stack (Whole bug shot added)

Post by lauriek »

I don't know what this is, pretty sure it's an insect as it seems to have 6 legs. I cannot see the eyes on this stack though.

The whole bug is around 4-5mm long, and is sort of round at the front and just tapers in all the way to a point at the rear.

Image

Any thoughts?

Shot with the usual setup, bellows at minimum extension, 10x Nikon CF objective. Roughly 70 shots in the stack, aligned in CZP and stacked in Tufuse in two parts, those then combined as layers in PSP.
Last edited by lauriek on Thu Aug 14, 2008 11:48 am, edited 1 time in total.

rovebeetle
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Post by rovebeetle »

Hi Laurie!

That looks very much like a beetle of the family Phalacridae to me. If you could provide a shot from above ("rough and dirty") it would be easy to confirm.

The eyes in these beetles are hardly or not protruding from the head's outline and are most likely partly covered by the pronotum, that's why you can't see them.

Cheers
Harry

Aynia
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Post by Aynia »

Lovely photo. More arty than scientific...which is what makes it great. :D

lauriek
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Post by lauriek »

Thanks Harry, I'll knock out a quick shot of this when I get home tonight!!

Thanks Aynia, yes I liked the way this one came out - I did the stack slightly differently than usual, I found when I put all the images together in the stacking software, it came out really badly where the antenna cross over that shiny shell.

So I produced two half stacks, one with just the antennae in focus, and one with everything behind them in focus, I then merged the two layers together in PSP using 'hard light' as the merge method. It increased the contrast dramatically, which I then had to tweak down a little with a levels layer, but I liked the overall effect!

augusthouse
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Post by augusthouse »

Nice technique Laurie, and I really like the composition here.

Craig
To use a classic quote from 'Antz' - "I almost know exactly what I'm doing!"

lauriek
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Post by lauriek »

Harry, here's the whole thing! Sorry it's not from above, I've had trouble mounting this specimen as it's quite slippery, I can't get it to stand up straight!!

Image

I just measured it, without the antennae it is 3mm long.

rovebeetle
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Post by rovebeetle »

I was completely wrong after all.

That is a Staphylinidae, genus Tachyporus, most likely T. solutus.

Shame on me, Staphylinidae is my specialty :oops: , but not the subfamily Tachyporinae, though.

Cheers
Harry

rovebeetle
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Post by rovebeetle »

Just recognized that the beetle is only 3mm long, which might rather point towards Tachyporus nitidulus. Well, as I just wrote, Tachyporinae is not my particular field of expertize.

Cheers
Harry

lauriek
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Post by lauriek »

Thanks a lot Harry, for me and smaller beetles even getting to genus level is an accomplishment! ;)

It's actually a really attractive little thing, I think I'm going to try to do some more stacks of this... It's not obvious on this resized image but it has an interesting 'oily' effect on the black bit above the face..

rovebeetle
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Post by rovebeetle »

BTW - as you can see in that lateral view, it actually has rather large eyes.

Cheers
Harry

lauriek
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Post by lauriek »

It does have quite large eyes, but for some reason they seem to be particularly difficult to photograph! I had another go, and you can certainly see the eye in this shot, but the shot does have some issues and I'm not at all happy with it, although I like the way you seem to be able to see the innards through the shell on the top...

Image

I suspect, looking at this shot, that the individual lenses on the compound eye don't stick up as much as found on some other bugs, but I could be wrong!

The eye may just look flat because I had to use a /lot/ of diffusion, ended up with the flash on almost full power! This bug is super shiny at this level of magnification...

rovebeetle
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Post by rovebeetle »

Laurie, the ocelli in that group are rather flat.

The integument is somewhat translucent and because (particularly the pronotum) is weakly pigmented you are partly able to see what's underneath.

Cheers
Harry

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