Thanks to all who commented, Alan, Toine, Dan, Eric, Mark, Brian!
Eric, - to answer your question: I used Pentax D-FA 100/2.8 Macro Lens
(the older version, not WR).
I tried a few different settings.
The area was in a shade of a tree and a shed, but depending on the
direction there was some bright areas in the background.
So, I tried without a flash. But then, I used the built-in flash (I was
too lazy to go back to the house for the external one).
I was trying to close down the aperture, to increas the DOF.
These two shots were done with the flash, - hence some catch lights.
1/180 f/10 ISO 400
1/160 f/4.5 ISO 1600 (I forgot to dial it down when I turned on the
flash).
Some photos were taken with the hand-held camera, and then I brought a
tripod. Besides the breeze, one of the challenges was the awkard height
of the spider:
I couldn't take the picture while standing straight, and it was too far
in a full squat. So, I had to semi-squat, semi-bend, and shoot up from
below (to get the correct angle).
That is a position in which it was hard to stabilize yourself. The tripod
helped somewhat.
I also tried to do stacking, - but I don't think it worked (because of the
breeze). I might take a look at one series if/when I have time for that.
Igor
On Thu, 11 Jun 2015, Igor PDML-StR wrote:
Warning: not for people with arachnophobia.
Today, I saw a very unusual spider. It is called "spiny orb weaver", but it
looks like a stormtrooper:
http://42graphy.org/misc/2015-06-10-spider/
The second photo shows the unusually colorful butt (and you might be able to
see even the tiny thread coming from it to about 7:30)
The formal classification name is Gasteracantha cancriformis
http://goo.gl/5a3ui1
Apparently, these species are frequent in this part of the country.
It was hard to photograph this creature because of the light breeze that was
sufficient to move the web in and out of focus but insufficient to prevent me
from sweating in the over-90F heat.
All comments are welcome.
Igor
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