Bad Hair Day for a Bald Faced hornet

Images taken in a controlled environment or with a posed subject. All subject types.

Moderators: rjlittlefield, ChrisR, Chris S., Pau

abpho
Posts: 1524
Joined: Wed Aug 17, 2011 7:11 pm
Location: Earth

Bad Hair Day for a Bald Faced hornet

Post by abpho »

I foolishly decided it was a good idea to go grab a hornets nest.  Boy where they pissed. I can honestly say my heart was racing a bit. I was wondering how I would be able to call 911 in case I had some allergic reaction to their stings. This stack is a result of that idea.

The nest contained one queen, and three workers.  One worker got away. The nest might be salvageable.  It should be of interest to photograph.  

MP-E at 4:1 f/4. Mainly a PMAX stack with a bit of DMAP cloned back in. Tried a new trick to get the antennas to stay up. Anyone care to guess?
Image

rjlittlefield
Site Admin
Posts: 23564
Joined: Tue Aug 01, 2006 8:34 am
Location: Richland, Washington State, USA
Contact:

Re: Bad Hair Day for a Bald Faced hornet

Post by rjlittlefield »

Looks good. That obviously asymmetric jaw position adds some character, at least if I'm shamelessly anthropomorphizing.
abpho wrote:Tried a new trick to get the antennas to stay up. Anyone care to guess?
Props outside the frame?

--Rik

canonian
Posts: 891
Joined: Tue Aug 31, 2010 4:00 am
Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands
Contact:

Re: Bad Hair Day for a Bald Faced hornet

Post by canonian »

abpho wrote:Anyone care to guess?
Shot it upside down and let gravity do its work while drying/preparing the specimen ?

abpho
Posts: 1524
Joined: Wed Aug 17, 2011 7:11 pm
Location: Earth

Re: Bad Hair Day for a Bald Faced hornet

Post by abpho »

canonian wrote:Shot it upside down and let gravity do its work...
Absolutely correct. I have no idea why I never thought of it sooner. If I get to live one million years I will be the smartest person alive.

abpho
Posts: 1524
Joined: Wed Aug 17, 2011 7:11 pm
Location: Earth

Post by abpho »

Started to [dis]colour a little. And gravity is not working as well as it was either.

Image

crisarg
Posts: 287
Joined: Sun Jan 23, 2011 11:25 am

Post by crisarg »

Very nice effort, I like both pictures!

Cristian
Cristian Arghius

Flickr

DQE
Posts: 1653
Joined: Tue Jul 08, 2008 1:33 pm
Location: near Portland, Maine, USA

Post by DQE »

Great photos - I love the asymmetrical mandibles, too.
-------------------------------

I've seen 2 disturbed bumblebee nests (in the ground), and one disturbed nest somewhat similar to yours, located upin the air on a building.

The disturbed bumblebees went berserk, and all available bees swarmed out of the nest and attacked me about 15 feet away. The provoking action on my part was simply to run my gas-powered lawnmower across their nest entrance hole in the lawn (I didn't know they were there, and assume they must have been newly migrated bumblebees). The same thing happened 2 years later, with the same accidental provocation. I have no idea how to spot them since they can apparently make a nest within about 1 week in a lawn. The entrance hole was about 12 mm in diameter. I exterminated the nest after they swarmed and stung me, as you might expect. Something like 10 stings on my legs before I could escape. Fortunately, I am not allergic, but it was still very painful.

The hornets/yellow jackets/whatever were a different situation, with their nest on a neighbor's garage, underneath a rain gutter. When disturbed by the neighbor poking at them from a distance, they swarmed out, seemingly all of them, and searched for someone to attack. It was a remarkable and somewhat frightening sight, even from a distance.

Thus, I've never understood how so many macro shooters get away with photographing such nests close up, with flash guns, etc. The bees/wasps just seem inherently unstable with respect to a perceived threat to their nest...

Nest-based macro photography sure makes for great macro photos, though!
-Phil

"Diffraction never sleeps"

abpho
Posts: 1524
Joined: Wed Aug 17, 2011 7:11 pm
Location: Earth

Post by abpho »

Thanks for all the comments.
DQE wrote:...I have no idea how to spot them since they can apparently make a nest within about 1 week in a lawn...
I have no idea. Get a lawn mower with a longer handle?
...Fortunately, I am not allergic, but it was still very painful.
Most people start of that way. Better play it safe. Usually it is never the first or second sting that causes a reaction.
Thus, I've never understood how so many macro shooters get away with photographing such nests close up, with flash guns, etc. The bees/wasps just seem inherently unstable with respect to a perceived threat to their nest...
I once approached a small Paper Wasp nest. It was located four feet (1.2m) up from ground level. Four to six wasps were actively moving around on the nest. It was warm and they were very active.

I think the URL is too long. I can't add the direct link from my website. See images 4-6 on my website here.

I found that their eye sight is not that great. They see light and dark (contrast), which means movement. I would first shade them from the sun. Wait. Bet into semi-position. Wait. Bring camera up to subject. Wait. Bring face to camera. Wait. Start taking pictures. In the third image you see a very pissed Paper Wasp. Rigid stance with mandibles open and wings flapping. I just stayed put. If I would have make a sudden move, all four of them would have been all over me like a fat kid on a smarty.
Nest-based macro photography sure makes for great macro photos, though!
I'd like to see/do more. Having some pertinent environmental structure in the shot really helps. That is why one of my more recent Paper Wasp captures I actually snagged the wasp along with its hive all in one swoop. This is the result of that. I was trying for better backgrounds and props to help with my studio shots.

As for the hornets....well....a lack of sudden moves on my end is most probably why they did not seek a target to attack. It would not have ended well for me.

rjlittlefield
Site Admin
Posts: 23564
Joined: Tue Aug 01, 2006 8:34 am
Location: Richland, Washington State, USA
Contact:

Post by rjlittlefield »

DQE wrote:Thus, I've never understood how so many macro shooters get away with photographing such nests close up, with flash guns, etc.
Aggressiveness varies wildly depending on species and other conditions that I'm sure I don't have a clue about.

My own experience with bumblebees was completely different from yours. My nest was underground in the garden, and I literally dug into it and exposed it using an ordinary hand shovel. The results were quite fascinating. Those bumblebees showed no interest at all in me or my wife, who were very soon to be found crouching over the nest watching the adults do what they could for the exposed little ones. Unfortunately the nest was completely trashed by that point and ultimately all the bugs either left or died.

The most frequently found paper wasp in my area is now the European immigrant Polistes dominula, a species that is generally described as getting along well with people. I have managed to get stung by them a couple of times, but only on severe provocation. Once was when I cut into a nest with hedge trimmers, and a second time was when I found a small nest by braille while opening the tailgate latch on my truck. Both times were one sting only.

Those experiences make me pretty confident in working with those species.

Bald hornets, on the other hand, make me a rather more cautious since the only time I got stung by one of those was when I made the mistake of pitching a piece of debris at their nest from about 20 feet away. I got a couple of good pictures of hornets flying around the nest. Everything seemed fine until suddenly one flew in from someplace out in right field, 90 degrees away from the nest as far as I was concerned, and popped me on the end of the nose. I was impressed by that particular piece of thread identification, and resolved to not push my luck in the future.
abpho wrote: I think the URL is too long. I can't add the direct link from my website. See images 4-6 on my website here.

Hmmm, I don't know what's going on there. The URL's look perfectly ordinary, and they work fine for me. I assume you're talking about here, here, and here?

--Rik

abpho
Posts: 1524
Joined: Wed Aug 17, 2011 7:11 pm
Location: Earth

Post by abpho »

rjlittlefield wrote:I assume you're talking about here, here, and here?
Not quite.

The actual link to the image is:
test link

And now it works. :roll:

rjlittlefield
Site Admin
Posts: 23564
Joined: Tue Aug 01, 2006 8:34 am
Location: Richland, Washington State, USA
Contact:

Post by rjlittlefield »

Don't you hate it when that happens? :x

Most likely there was a stray carriage return someplace between the url tags. That stops them from working at all, and it can be the devil's own time to spot. Other than that, the most frequent problem is a few characters like parentheses that the forum software does not recognize as legitimate in URLs.

--Rik

Yousef Alhabshi
Posts: 172
Joined: Fri Feb 04, 2011 3:06 am
Location: United Arab Emirates
Contact:

Post by Yousef Alhabshi »

Great images.. & thank you for the tip!!
How come I never ever thought of shooting the insect upside down?! :?

Did you do anything to the jaw to keep it open?
most of the wasps/insects I shoot once died they close their jaws where I won't be able to open them again...

I've been stinged many times by bees/wasps when I was a kid.. the worst was when I got 3 stings on my nick!! it was the worst & I was hospitalized.. luckily I wasn't having any allergic for these stings at that times!!!!
I don't know if this happened to any of you.. but seems my body now became so allergic to these stings.. not only that.. but probably any stings or bites by insects in general.

There was one time I was shooting close to a lake & I didn't notice all of the mosquitoes flying around me.. so within a few minutes my arms was fully swallowed by their bites (around 5~bites I believe) & kept that way for 10 days!!
The doctor who examined me thought at the 1st examine that I broke my arm :lol:

I believe I have to be very careful from now on!

abpho
Posts: 1524
Joined: Wed Aug 17, 2011 7:11 pm
Location: Earth

Post by abpho »

That's pretty bad Yousef. Better take care.

As for the jaw. I forced it open and held it that way for a little bit. I am sure there are nicer methods.

lauriek
Posts: 2402
Joined: Sun Nov 25, 2007 6:57 am
Location: South East UK
Contact:

Post by lauriek »

Nicely done!!

The concept of shooting upside down has been discussed here before...

Post Reply Previous topicNext topic