leafcutter ant mating swarm, Arizona
The sparkle of these insects' wings was captured by pointing the camera at the sun while standing behind the mating swarm. I find backlighting to be one of the most pleasing effects for translucent wings.
photo details: Canon 100mm f2.8Â macro lens on a Canon EOS 20D
ISO 100, f/11, 1/500 sec
More like this
A whole bunch of papers got published on PLoS-ONE yesterday. I did not have time to check them out very closely yet, but a few titles immediatelly caught my attention:
This week's problem was composed by Mircea Manolescu in 1956. In the position below, it is white to move and mate in two.
That is so gross, yet also very cool.
Wow what a cool shot! I love the contrast and sharpness. Not an easy shot to get with all the light, movement, size of the subjects.. congrats.
Thanks Chris. This shot was the result of considerable planning. This ant species only flies early in the morning after the second summer rain, so we had to monitor the weather carefully and drive out to the right habitat at the right time to catch the flight. Miraculously, it worked.