Mosaic Monday: Bug Brigade

Time for Mosaic Monday, and I'm ready this week (for a change) thanks to a major break in my schedule that so fortuitously coincides with gardening season. One of the more surprising and fun discoveries I made last year with my DSLR (purchased on Ebay with my modest tax refund) was how clearly I could photograph bugs. It isn't always intentional; sometimes while I'm focusing on a flower, a bug I didn't notice with the naked eye will suddenly become clear in the viewfinder, as with the tiny yellow spider in the middle row, or land squarely in the frame, as the moth did on the gaillardia next to the spider image.

I also appreciate being able to choose between autofocus and manual focus; the spider definitely needed manual focus (as well as manual aperture and shutter speed) so that I could choose the depth of field and the exact area of focus, whereas I was lucky to catch the painted lady butterfly at bottom left with autofocus just before it flew away. I can also switch quickly, as I did for the photo at right: this lovely field of wildflowers near the crest of the Magdalenas suddenly offered a more interesting shot when the fly landed right in front of me, so I switched to manual to be sure I caught it in focus. (Confession: I had to take four shots to get one that was in focus. Just another reason I LOVE digital: no wasted prints for the 90% of shots that don't come out so well.)