I seem to be getting friendly with this Ashy Prinia (Prinia socialis). The Scientific name is also socialis . Anyway this Bird was posing for my Canon EF 400mm f/5.6 L USM with 24mm Kenko extension tube. Bird was hardly 2 meters from me.

Here is another closeup of the same bird

This panorama of Oleander Hawk-moth is by using 5 macro photos. In this tutorial I will use Adobe Photoshop CS4 which has greatly improved panorama tools, to produce this macro panorama. This version makes stitching odd photos so much easier than any other program I know of. If you notice these photos are not sequential like the normal pano shots we take. I took this way just to check the capability of Adobe Photoshop CS4 in identifying various segments. You will notice first two shots are of right and left wing, then three shots are of the body from top to bottom. This sort of mixed arrangement stumped most stitching applications out there.

My earlier favorite was PTGUI. When I tried it with these photos it failed miserably to recognize control points. The resulting panorama was a horrible mess. Adobe Photoshop CS4 excels in the aspect of recognition of various segments in the photos.

I was trying to photograph without tripod that day. My Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 USM Macro was not able to get the full moth at 1:1 magnification. I used 20mm Kenko extension tube along with 100 mm and photographed the moth in 5 pieces with the intention of stitching together later.

I had to make sure that background was as clutter less as possible. This was easy as it was quite dark outside and I was using my Canon MT-24EX macro twin light flash so that background would be dark.

Next thing I wanted to make sure that there will be at least 20% overlap of parts in each photo, otherwise Photoshop will find it difficult to stitch them together.

Once I imported the photos to Adobe Lightroom I selected these 5 shots and chose Edit in Photoshop as panorama.

After churning out a bit, Photoshop CS4 produced this beautiful image of the Oleander moth all stitched together.

I flattened all the layers and filled the transparent area with black around the moth. I also cropped and rotated to get this final result in Photoshop. So what we have at the end is around 100 mega pixel image of moth which is perfectly stitched and exposure blended. You can see this image at the beginning of this post.

If only I had tripod handy that day, I would have used macro focusing rail and could have taken several shots using canon MP-E 65mm 1x-5x macro and produced 1000 mega pixel monster photo ha ha, I was just joking

Anyway it was fun to try this panorama like stitching using macro that too with shots which were hand held. Photoshop CS4 has really improved its method of Photomerge and produces seamless stitching with excellent results. I hope this small tutorial helps many macro shooters out there who find their subject too big to fit in one frame

That evening I was trying to take photos of birds collecting building material for their nest from this Crown Flower (Calotropis gigantea) silk. I noticed this Blue Carpenter bee (Xylocopa violacea) hovering around the flowers. Sun was Harsh and I didn’t have any macro lens around. So I fixed 36 mm Kenko extension tube to my Canon EF 400mm f/5.6 L USM on Canon EOS 5D mark II and tried to shoot closeup shots of this Carpenter bee.

Then suddenly I saw a small black bee came and annoyed the carpenter bee so much that it just scooted away.

This reminded me the story of David & Goliath.

The Common Mime (Chilasa clytia) is a Swallowtail butterfly found in South and South-east Asia. The butterfly belongs to the Chilasa group or the Black-bodied Swallowtails. It serves an excellent example of a Batesian mimic among the Indian butterflies. Wingspan of 90-105 mm. This is butterfly has dimorphism for both sexes – there are two different colour forms for each sex. The lighter form dissimilis mimics the unpalatable Blue Tiger (Tirumala limniace) while the darker form clytia mimics the unpalatable “Crows”. This is clytia form which looks like Common Indian Crow (Euploea core).

The upper sides and under sides of clytia are a rich dark brown – the colour towards the margins of the wings is much paler. There is a series of creamy to white markings towards the outer margins, many of which are chevron shaped. The spots on the margins between the veins are creamy and small. Towards the outer margins of the hind wings, there are two rows of cream coloured chevrons, the outer being much smaller than the inner. The margins of the hind wings have orange yellow spots between the veins; the ones on the lower side are much larger. This specimen had the wings damaged so the the markings are not very clear.

The ground colour of the wings of dissimilis is blue-gray, with heavy black markings along the veins, giving it a somewhat reticulate appearance. The chevron shaped markings towards the outer margins are similar to those of form clytia.

This butterfly is found in India from Kangra to Sikkim, from Assam to Burma, Nepal, Bangladesh, Peninsular India and the Andaman Islands. It is also found in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Southern China (including Hainan), Hong Kong, Vietnam, Laos, Kampuchea, peninsular Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia (Flores, Alor, Timor and Moa). Several regional variants and forms are recognized.

It usually flies within a few feet of the ground when searching for nectar or larval host plants. However, it is not uncommon to see it nectaring on blooms high up in the canopy. It prefers wooded areas with open spaces. It is not uncommon in home gardens.

It resembles its unpalatable Danaid models exceptionally well, not only in its markings and general coloration, but also in its behavior. For instance, when flying, it glides for a considerable distance after taking a few leisurely wing beats. After settling on a flower, it keeps its wings quite still like the models and does not continuously vibrate its wings like a typical swallowtail. Like its models, it sleeps with its wings folded over its body, often hanging onto a twig.

It is interesting to note that form clytia in Sri Lanka differs from its subspecies in India in almost the same way that the Indian Common Crow in Sri Lanka differs from its subspecies in India, illustrating the evolutionary selection pressure exerted on the mimics to look more and more like the model in their own environment.

The larvae feed on species of Litsea, Cinnamomum and Nauclea. The pupa of this butterfly is remarkably well camouflaged and resembles a broken twig so well that if a bird were to memorize its image, it will probably pick many dead twigs before it gets it right!

This Female Oriental Garden Lizard (Calotes versicolor) was photographed using Canon EF 400mm f/5.6 L USM & 24mm extension tube set.
It is an agamid lizard found widely distributed in Asia. It has also been introduced in many parts other parts of the world. It is an insectivore and the male gets a bright red throat in the breeding season leading to a incorrect name of Bloodsucker. These lizards can change their colours, quite rapidly, but not as rapidly as chameleons.

Oriental Garden Lizard also known as Changeable Lizards are usually a dull brown, grey or olive with speckles or bands, but can can be seen in other colours such as bright green. These colour changes may reflect their moods. During the breeding season, the male’s head and shoulders turns bright orange to crimson and his throat black. Males also turn red-headed after a successful battle with rivals. Thus their other gruesome name of “Bloodsucker Lizard”. But they don’t actually suck anybody’s blood! Both males and females have a crest from the head to nearly the tail, hence their other common name “Crested Tree Lizard”.

Changeable Lizards are related to iguanas (which are found only in the New World). Unlike other lizards, they do not drop their tails (autotomy), and their tails can be very long, stiff and pointy. Like other reptiles, they shed their skins. Like chameleons, Changeable Lizards can move each of their eyes in different directions.

Changeable Lizards eat mainly insects and small vertebrates, including rodents and other lizards. Although they have teeth, these are designed for gripping prey and not tearing it up. So prey is swallowed whole, after it is stunned by shaking it about. Sometimes, young inexperienced Changeable Lizards may choke on prey which are too large. They are commonly found among the undergrowth in open habitats including highly urban areas. The lizards were introduced to Singapore from Malaysia and Thailand in the 1980s.

Breeding: Males become highly territorial during breeding season. They discourage intruding males by brightening their red heads and doing “push-ups”. Each tries to attract a female by inflating his throat and drawing attention to his handsomely coloured head. About 10-20 eggs are laid, buried in moist soil. The eggs are long, spinde-shaped and covered with a leathery skin. They hatch in about 6-7 weeks. They are able to breed at about 1 year old.

Role in the habitat: Changeable Lizards control the population of their prey. In turn, they are food for predators higher up in the food chain.

Status and threats: The Changeable Lizard is relatively common and found in a wide range of habitats. They appear to adapt well to humans and are thus not endangered.