Lighting Flies

[Bruce Norikane 0]

I don't think the LED strips are necessarily spotty. Since there are a lot of lights in a strip, they tend to overlap each other along the length of the strip. Across the width of the strip, they could cast some shadows, but you could gang a couple of strips for more width.

 

LED's are not very bright though. You're probably better off with some reflectors on the bottom.

 

How bright is your main light?

[Piker20 0]

I'll take another look at the led sets.

[Bruce Norikane 0]

I'll take another look at the led sets.

 

A simple white paper reflector may work just as well. Many white LED's have weird color gaps that can cause odd color casts in photos.

 

What light source are you using?

[Piker20 0]

As its only for forum pics and my own record I currently use a torch or just sunlight when there is some. I don't have a flex head desk lamp or would use that. Because I use an open box to hold the fly, with foil sides, I can bounce the light on the sides and not direct to the fly. I keep seeing the round and straight led strips sold for cupboards or sheds at silly cheap prices. The better option would be a good light from the top and one from front but I don't see the need for something fancy for a one off use.

[Bruce Norikane 0]

As its only for forum pics and my own record I currently use a torch or just sunlight when there is some. I don't have a flex head desk lamp or would use that. Because I use an open box to hold the fly, with foil sides, I can bounce the light on the sides and not direct to the fly. I keep seeing the round and straight led strips sold for cupboards or sheds at silly cheap prices. The better option would be a good light from the top and one from front but I don't see the need for something fancy for a one off use.

I totally agree with using cheap lights and DIY setups. I also love simple setups.

 

Here's a very cheap, simple setup as shown in the photo below:

1. Cheap clamp light from Target that I had laying around with bright lightbulb from Walmart.
2. Styrofoam cup as described by Henry.
3. Piece of gray paper for background

Notice there's no tripod or lightbox required. I can use any light with a bright enough bulb. The bulb in the picture is a 100 watt incandescent flood light from Walmart, but I've used normal bright bulbs.

 

With the flood close to the fly, I don't even need the styrofoam cup, but the cup serves to hold the fly and decreases the shadows.

 

The second photo is without the cup and shows the value of the big flood. The bulb was very close to the fly.

 

Two reason the cup works so well,

1. Eliminates the tripod. The cup holds the fly fixed to the camera, so you can handhold the camera or set it down on a table. Tripods are used for macro because everything is magnified including any shake which contributes to blurriness.
2. No special lamp. Because you can handhold, I sometimes just hold the camera/cup/fly next to the closest light. Light power diminishes at the square of the distance between light source and subject, so closer is much brighter. With the cup, you can hold within inches the bulb.

[FlaFly 0]

Bruce... that photo of the fly is incredible! You can practically see the mites crawling on the deer hair! :-)

 

It's certainly a good argument for your way of taking photos.

[Bruce Norikane 0]

Bruce... that photo of the fly is incredible! You can practically see the mites crawling on the deer hair! :-)

 

It's certainly a good argument for your way of taking photos.

 

It's embarrassing, actually. I don't dare show most of my sloppy ties.

 

There are many better methods, and you see examples every day on this forum and in this thread..., but this is cheap and simple. I did not invent the styrofoam cup macro setup. I saw it somewhere used for coins and saw that it would be a simple setup for flies.

 

BTW - many thanks to Silver who took a quick post that I made a few years ago, made some improvements, documented it in detail, then published it all over.