May 2009 Sightings

[nick patel]

1 DOB, 3 Dingy skipper and 10+ Pearl bordered fritillary at Gait barrows yesterday. Also saw one of those micro moths, they go on about there - Ananias funebris

At Meathop, loads (not exaggerated) of Greenstreaks, Brimstone and 20+ Painted lady flying north through. A couple Orange tip as well.

Warton crag: Holly blue, 2 Brimstone (Male, Female), lots of whites and a single PB fritillary.

cheers.

[Ian Pratt]

Hi all,

An outing yesterday to West Yatton Down with eccle's & then on to Hazelbury common, for the recently emerged Marsh Fritillary's after 1 was sighted there on the previous Thursday. We also met up with Rogerdodge who stopped by especially for the Marsh Fritillary's, was good to see you again. Luckily there were at least 4 possibly 5 seen. Dingy Skippers were also out in force there as well, none previously sighted this year.

Marsh Fritillary


Marsh Fritillary


Dingy Skipper


Brown Argus @ West Yatton Down


P.S Excellent photo's every one

Great photos- what camera and lens did you use?

[Ian Pratt]

Any ideas what I am doing wrong as my photos look very vivid and with impact on my computer like the MF above taken by xmilehigh, whereas when uploaded to the Sightings page they appear washed out. In old file terms the photos are like Velvia on my computer but like Kodachrome on the internet. Any clues?

[sandraandkevin]

I have just noticed on the Durlston site (www.durlston.co.uk) that they had a sighting of a Black-Veined White yesterday.

I don't suppose we will get an invasion of these as well!!!!


Kevin

[Susie]

Painted ladies, painted ladies and more painted ladies! Oh, and a few pristine red admirals too.

[FISHiEE]

Any ideas what I am doing wrong as my photos look very vivid and with impact on my computer like the MF above taken by xmilehigh, whereas when uploaded to the Sightings page they appear washed out. In old file terms the photos are like Velvia on my computer but like Kodachrome on the internet. Any clues?

Hi Ian,

I had the exact same problem. It's to do with the colour space your image is saved in. AdobeRGB lookes washed out on the web. sRGB looks best.

Check the following link:

http://www.ephotozine.com/u18805/gallery/1223794

If you hold the mouse sursor over the small 1 and 2 bottom right of the main image it flicks between two versions of the image. The only difference is 1 is saved as AdobeRGB (a bit washed out) whereas 2 is sRGB(Bright and punchy). It makes a big difference for the web. In photoshop however they look identical!

Hope that helps

John

[Jack Harrison]

With great embarrassment, I admit a serious error.

On Sunday, I observed a steady stream of fast flying butterflies counting 20 in ten minutes. They were seen distantly and I presumed from the brownish/orange colour that they were Painted Ladies. After all, an immigration of Painted Ladies was anticipated following reports of their abundance on the Continent. Size was difficult to judge and I had the impression that they were a little small for Painted Ladies but that was very subjective.

I returned home and prepared my report. Then on the Cambs & Essex BC website, there was a flash report of a “massive migration” of Clouded Yellows observed at a location a mere three kilometres “upstream” of where I made my observations. That report was made by someone of considerable experience so suddenly the penny dropped – I had witnessed a migration of Clouded Yellows (which can in flight look remarkably brownish/orange). So I too submitted my observations as being of Clouded Yellows.

To the best of my knowledge, there have been few other reports of Clouded Yellows since but of course, enormous numbers of Painted Ladies have been seen, on migration on Sunday and subsequently lingering.

So, I have to correct my report. I observed migrating Painted Ladies not Clouded Yellows on Sunday 24th May 2009. I don’t know if that other – apparently highly responsible - observer has had second thoughts.

Jack

[Jack Harrison]

Ian wrote:

Any ideas what I am doing wrong as my photos look very vivid and with impact on my computer like the MF above taken by xmilehigh, whereas when uploaded to the Sightings page they appear washed out

Not quite that same problem but an associated one. I have already corresponded with Pete.

I had commented a few weeks ago that the pages were too big and took forever to download. Pete then – very obligingly – changed things slightly so that a reduced size image was shown, clicking on which brought up a good quality picture. But the problem now is that the page images can look very poor, so much so that I often don’t investigate further.

It’s all a question of compromises. I have found with my own website that automatic resizing for the page produces similarly poor results. So I put a manually (for want of better word) resized image of far better quality which when clicked goes to an 800x600 picture.
http://www.snapperjack.co.uk

My suggestion for what it is worth is that genuine small thumbnails are displayed on ukbutterfly pages rather than the “middling” sizes that are used at present. Everyone knows that thumbnails are mere guides to what is available. I’m not sure that we – subconsciously or otherwise – think of 440x350 pixel images in quite the same way.

Jack

[Pete Eeles]

Any ideas what I am doing wrong as my photos look very vivid and with impact on my computer like the MF above taken by xmilehigh, whereas when uploaded to the Sightings page they appear washed out. In old file terms the photos are like Velvia on my computer but like Kodachrome on the internet. Any clues?

Hi Ian - does this apply to the full-size image as well as the thumbnail?

If so - then the problem is that the application your using to view your image probably performs proper colour management - whereas most web browsers don't. You therefore need to compensate for that. I personally go from Lightroom (colour-managed) to JPEG. I think tweak the image in Paint Shop Pro (with colour management off, so I can see what I'm getting) before posting on the web.

Cheers,

- Pete

[Pete Eeles]

My suggestion for what it is worth is that genuine small thumbnails are displayed on ukbutterfly pages rather than the “middling” sizes that are used at present.

Thanks Jack.

I've set up a poll at http://www.ukbutterflies.co.uk/phpBB2/v ... =16&t=3173.

The size of the thumbnail is easily changed - much smaller thumbnails will require users to always click to see the image properly - with faster download times.

Cheers,

- Pete

[eccles]

I saw my first silver 'Y' moth of the year yesterday in my home patch near Willsbridge, and half a dozen plus painted ladies at Willsbridge Mill.

[xmilehigh]

Hi Ian,

Thanks for the compliment . Here’s a brief synopsis of equipment & post processing used for those photo’s and the majority of my photo’s.

Equipment :
Camera Sony α900
Lens Sony 100mm Macro
Jessop’s Monopod

Camera settings:
All images are taken in RAW
Aperture priority (sometimes manual).
Usually center weighted or spot metering.
Neutral option instead of normal / vivid / scene etc (No idea what options exist on other manufacturers camera’s). This setting apparently reduces the amount of in camera processing, allowing me a greater control in PP (Post processing). I read this on the internet so it must be true !!
ISO 200 This is the native ISO for this camera & seems to yield good results rather than say ISO 100. I always try to keep this as low as possible in order to keep any noise to a minimum. As the α900 can be quite noisy when using higher ISO settings.
Colour space set to SRGB
Noise reduction – normal

Post Processing:
Raw files are developed with Capture One (I found this to my liking with the a900 images).
Due to the camera being set to neutral, the images always look a bit flat and a little dull so in most cases the following settings are tweaked in Capture One.
Contrast increased from 5 – 15 rarely more
Saturation increased from 5 – 15 if it’s really flat then maybe 20.
The Image is then exported to PhotoShop as an 8bit tiff file with the sharpening option turned off as I have found the results better to sharpen once the image has been resized.
Noise reduction used to clean up the image, but set to retain the maximum amount of detail possible. I use Neat Image which has a Photoshop pluggin.
Image is cropped if required.
Image is resized for it’s intended purpose either web display or printing.
Then the image is sharpened using the PS function Unsharp mask.
Amount 25 <> 150 (depends on the image)
Radius: 1.0
Threshold 1

As previously mentioned the colour space you work in is important. I have everything set to SRGB, camera, software & most importantly web display. When uploading images I have noticed that some web sites will resize images automatically sometimes they do a good job and on occasion they can completely mangle the image, so I resize appropriate to where the image will be displayed.

This is where I’m currently at, it will probably change as I learn more, discover other ways to achieve the final image. There are many ways to achieve the end result, this is just what works for me and it's really not as long winded as it reads .

Cheers

[Charles Nicol]

saw my first Red Admiral of the season yesterday. Very bright & fresh-looking.


charles

[Jack Harrison]

Re poll as to image size:

Excellent – up to a point. However, the option people make will to a large extend depend on their broadband speed. The unfortunates who never get decent broadband speed will be disadvantaged if the majority opt for full size images on the page

Maybe it’s asking too much of you Pete, but might it be possible to set up the website so that it offers users the choice? Different personal situations have different requirements.

Jack

[Pete Eeles]

Excellent – up to a point. However, the option people make will to a large extend depend on their broadband speed. The unfortunates who never get decent broadband speed will be disadvantaged if the majority opt for full size images on the page

Just trying to understand where the "sweet spot" is. Currently - it looks like things will stay as they are (medium-sized images).

Maybe it’s asking too much of you Pete, but might it be possible to set up the website so that it offers users the choice? Different personal situations have different requirements.

Unfortunately, that would be too much work to realistically do.

Cheers,

- Pete

[FISHiEE]

Are we talking about smaller images on forum posts of for the photo competition galleries?

I notice that several posters have small images in forums which then link to larger versions. I actually quite like this but just assumed it was a feature of your image hosting site and not the forums? I just upload the image to my own website and then link to it in the threads.

As for competition images if you upload a large file then the images is just re-sized to 800 pixels or whatever and not sharpened resulting in a very large image ending up pretty soft. I just upload a correctly sized and sharpened image so no further re-sizing and therefore softening is applied...

[Pete Eeles]

Are we talking about smaller images on forum posts of for the photo competition galleries?

Forum posts.

I notice that several posters have small images in forums which then link to larger versions. I actually quite like this but just assumed it was a feature of your image hosting site and not the forums?

Nope - it's a feature of the forums.

I just upload the image to my own website and then link to it in the threads.

That's a different mechanism where you use the IMG tag.

As for competition images if you upload a large file then the images is just re-sized to 800 pixels or whatever and not sharpened resulting in a very large image ending up pretty soft. I just upload a correctly sized and sharpened image so no further re-sizing and therefore softening is applied...

Me too

Cheers,

- Pete

[bugmadmark]

My first Painted Lady of the year (21st May) Brownsea Island (Dorset Wildlife Trust reserve)

and whilst numbers of butterflies were low on the island when I was there last week, I did stumble across this young lady

The kids, wife and I enjoyed handling here before returning her to her patrol. I'd not seen one of these in the wild since I was a kid. Slow worms are such beautiful creatures and the kids learnt a lot whilst handling her.

and as I had so few butterflies to practice photgraphing I turned to these...
'Large Red' Damselflies

Wasp Beetle climbing up the visitor centre wall which was covered in Pipistrel bat droppings and the 400+ strong colony of bats could be heard through the low eaves!

[bugmadmark]

on 25-05-2009 took a trip to Strumpshaw Fen near Norwich in hope of seeing my first ever Swallowtail. I had heard that the first one had been sighted the week before. When we arrived at lunchtime the weather was overcast, humid and windy with sunny intervals. As soon as I arrived the lady on the desk told me a swallowtail had been seen earlier that morning. I was very hopeful and it paid off as I saw my first sigthing as it flew past the entrance hide! My wife saw a second a few minutes later but I was too busy looking down into the nettles at the large number of harelquin ladybirds. Sadly, despite walinking round the entire fen and wearing my kids out - we never saw anymore - not even in the Swallowtail hotspots. I shall return! However, i tried to put good use to the day by practicising on any insect that moved. My first is this butterfly which I assume must be a Common Blue - but it has orange spots on the upperside of the wings. All of my books show the butterfly as having no ornage spots - except for an Irish form so Id be please to learn more from the expert here! It appeared to be ovipositing on what I beleive is a birds-foot trefoil? Ive included a few other attempts withthe 150mm to show I tried to fill my day!

Common Blue (?) Strumpshaw Fen 25 May 2009

Banded Demoiselle Strumpshaw Fen 25 May 2009

Black-tailed Skimmer Strumpshaw Fen 25 May 2009 (why do Dragonflies insist in hiding in distracting backgrounds? )

[GsButterflies]

Hi Mark,

To me (no expert) I would call it as a Female - Adonis Blue. I'm sure one of the more experienced will confirm.

I'm hoping to get to Norfolk later on in June hopefully to see Swallowtail's. As I have never seen one before I would love to get some images while I'm there.

Cheers G