www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

I bumped into Andrew Middleton on Sunday (Waterford Heath) and there were wide-ranging discussions. Andrew mentioned how butterflies undoubtedly see in ultra-violet as well as in what we call “visual” wavelengths. I was aware of this but it was a useful reminder. Andrew was for example fairly sure that Purple Emperors in tree tops (difficult for humans to see) can be located by other Purple Emperors very readily because they “glow” in u/v. We started talking about u/v photography but then the conversation drifted – some sort of distraction by a damned Grizzled Skipper as I recall - and that line of thought got truncated.

Is u/v photography (or indeed infra-red) for amateurs such as ourselves possible? I would imagine there would be spectacular results; Orange Tips perhaps looking orange and blue, not orange and white.

Jack

jackharr wrote:I bumped into Andrew Middleton on Sunday (Waterford Heath) and there were wide-ranging discussions. Andrew mentioned how butterflies undoubtedly see in ultra-violet as well as in what we call “visual” wavelengths. I was aware of this but it was a useful reminder. Andrew was for example fairly sure that Purple Emperors in tree tops (difficult for humans to see) can be located by other Purple Emperors very readily because they “glow” in u/v. We started talking about u/v photography but then the conversation drifted – some sort of distraction by a damned Grizzled Skipper as I recall - and that line of thought got truncated.

Is u/v photography (or indeed infra-red) for amateurs such as ourselves possible? I would imagine there would be spectacular results; Orange Tips perhaps looking orange and blue, not orange and white.

Jack

Hi Jack

Not sure about this but AFAIUI most transparent glasses and plastics are black to nearly all UV so I don't know how you go about filming in the UV. As for IR, digital camera sensors have a coating on to reduce sensitivity to IR, but they can still detect it. If you want to check whether your camera can, point a TV remote at your camera and press a button. You should see the transmitting bulb flicker on your cameras screen (invisible to our eyes of course). Obviously need it in live view on a DSLR you won't see it through the viewfinder.

Cheers

Bill

Thanks for that i/r test. My camera is apparently NOT sensitive to i/r, but my goodness, while carrying out the test, the TV swiched to channels that I didn't know existed.

Jack