More Butterflies

After an afternoon of frustration trying to study and not being very successful at it, I decided to take advantage of the free admission day at the Flower Conservatory and see the winged beauties at the Butterfly Zone before the exhibit ends on November 2.

I had a very relaxing hour clicking on my Canon 40D with the macro EF 100mm 1:2.8 lens. Although I was only able to use the tripod as a monopod (facility restriction), the images turned out really great. These are the three pictures that I really like.

While taking pictures, I met another amature with almost the same camera as mine. We started to talk about how the stripes of the zebra butterfly looks white instead of yellow in the picture. He told me a little bit about using RAW format instead of JPEG so I could preserve the real colors in my subjects. It all sounded good but I don't really have the time to edit the image after shooting. Besides, RAW files will take so much more memory, something that I am not really looking forward to dealing with right now. Therefore, I am sticking with JPEGs for a while.

A little bit into our conversation, he started offering his lenses so I could try using them (his backpack was full of lenses, used ones that he bought from other photography enthusiasts). I felt kind of bad holding his camera to try out the lens that he claims to be "a very good lens," but I didn't want to offend him by not taking his offer. I wonder if, someday, I will become as generous with my photo equipment as he was. As of now, no one is touching my "baby." I was even reluctant to lend it to my dad! Talking about obsession!