I've been having a blast shooting with my macro lens lately, but today I did some focus stacking to see how my K-3 would perform. I source my butterflies already dead (or close to it) along the local roads and highways. Our traffic kills so many of them it's a wonder they've persisted this long. My only competition in collecting them appears to be from the ants, though if I find ants carrying a prize I don't generally steal it from them. I've found precious few this year compared to the last two. The first three shots below are each comprised of around a hundred exposures.
This shot shows the swallowtail's head, including the injury that probably killed it.
Scales from the top of the wing, near the base of one of the "tiger stripes". The long hair-like setae generally run parallel to the butterfly's body.
I like this one. It shows "butterfly amber" as I think of it. Sometimes as they dry their wing veins become more vitreous in appearance. If you look carefully at the clearest patches you can see the scales on the opposite side of the wing. This area is on the underwing, also close to the body.
This shows the base of the butterfly's proboscis. Contrary to popular belief, their proboscis is not tubular like a straw. They can separate it down the middle from tip to base, and they can move the halves independently, to clean them. The tooth-like structures remind me of a zipper. This one is 736 exposures. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out.
It amazes me how something with such a tiny brain can manage to coordinate graceful movements involving so many limbs, while manipulating complicated organs like the proboscis, never mind while also flying, searching for food and evading threats concurrently. We do not give insects enough credit, or critters in general, for that matter.
Originally posted by PJ1 
Post #1 by Philoslothical
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