At 10:53 AM 8/20/2005, Bob Shell wrote:
Is it just me, or does it seem to others like this guy went to one hell of a lot of trouble to produce photos that really aren't that great?
I thought some of the images were nice enough. I think he mostly needs to be more selective in which images he actually publishes. I get the impression that his gadget actually determines when to take the picture. That eliminates the benefit of human intelligence controlling the composition. I suspect he gets lots of poorly composed shots, and only a relatively few nice ones. Still, I can't imagine getting a high percentage of nice shots of FLYING insects, no matter what technique you might use.
I also agree that he went to a LOT of trouble to get them. It seems to me that his circuitry and laser arrangement is much more complicated than it needs to be. For example, instead of using 8 laser pointers, why not use one laser diode and several small mirrors to create a grid of laser lines which get broken when the bug flies through the plane of focus? It should be far cheaper and easier. Also, going to the trouble of rapidly pulsing the lasers, to prevent the sensors from being fooled by sunlight might not be needed if the sensors are simply AC-coupled, which is much easier and cheaper to arrange. (Admittedly, pulsing would reduce the power consumption somewhat, and would be handy if he intends to leave this rig running unattended for long periods of time using only battery power.)
Some people love creating their own electronics, and it's easy to get carried away with adding complexity. He probably got as much fun out of designing and building his "Laser-Guided Bug Blaster"(tm), as he's having with the photography.
I happen to be an electronics technician, and I've been planning to build some remote triggering devices for my *istDS (but not for flying insects.) I don't think I will be building anything so complicated as what this fellow did.
take care, Glen
