Hopefully I haven't "grossed out" anyone by posting this image.
I saw this little guy in the corner of our downstairs bathroom near the floor and thought it might be interesting to shoot a macro shot of him. He was just hanging upside down minding his own business and so I crept up on him with my Nikon D200 and Nikon 60mm f 2.8 micro lens and took my shot (Nikon calls macro lenses, "micro lenses.") This image was taken just a few minutes before posting it here, but I moved up the clock on the blog an hour so I can count this as my "Thursday Posting." :)
To light the shot, I used a Nikon SB-800 flash modified with a Gary Fong Lightsphere Cloud diffuser tethered by a remote cord. I placed the flash on the floor with the TTL sensor aimed at the spider and pointed the flash head up to the ceiling.
The camera was set at ISO 100 with the aperture at f 5.6 and the shutter speed chosen by the camera at 1/60 second. I was less than 8 inches from him.
This spider's size is about 1/4 inch, so what you are seeing is a really large close-up of him. Be sure to click on the image to get an ultra close-up view! Even very small spiders like this one can look really scary when a macro shot is taken of them.
No, I didn't "squish" him after the shot. He's still hanging there...
3 comments:
I'd "squish" that spider as it looks like a baby black widow. Confirmation would be the web (is it ornate or a rat's nest) and does it hide when a bright white light is shone on it (a photo flash is too brief). A rat's nest web and running/hiding from bright white light means it's likely a black widow. Of course you could let it grow and wait until it changes black and gets the red hour glass on the adobmen (female black widows only).
Thanks for your comment and concern.
I used to live in San Diego and can recognize a Black Widow spider as we had these in our garage! Scary things!
No, I don't think this one is a black widow. It's really way too small and I've seen many of these before. They don't grow any larger than about 1/4 inch total. The Black Widows I've seen are much bigger in size. Still, when these little spiders are magnified by photography, they do look so much like their larger cousins... it's frightening!
I don't like spiders in general, but have no fear of these little ones.
I once caught a big spider in San Diego and put him in a jar and kept him alive for about a month by feeding him "rolie polies" and flies. Have you ever seen how a Spider attacks a fly? He waits until the best moment to attack and then literally grabs the fly and spins him around many times, wrapping the fly in a web. Then he bites into the fly and sucks all the juices out of him! Literally, the fly shrivels up and looks "freeze dried" in just a quick moment. I'm not kidding... it's quite shocking... and educational.
Good one
They were probably here before us humans and will probably be here after we are gone
That same week my wife found what she says was a 3” - 4” long spider in her craft room
:)
Post a Comment