Showing nature naturally
Now that DV cameras are so much easier to use, and produce such good results, I guess that there are a good number of people using them to film butterflies. If you are, we would be glad to hear of your experiences; why not write to us at our email address? Others might be interested to hear what you have done.
But if you haven’t started yet, perhaps my story may encourage you to have a go.
My interest in butterflies began when I had just bought my first Canon Single Lens Reflex (still) camera in 1962, and took a close-up of a brilliant red and white Pierid (actually a Common Jezebel, Delias eucharis) while I was visiting a Mission Hospital in North India. The butterflies were feeding all over a huge bush of Poinsettia, a glorious scarlet against the clear blue sky of a North Indian winter’s day. When I saw the result, it wasn’t long before I was visiting the local Nursery Gardens at regular intervals, and planning trips to far away places like Darjeeling and Sikkim, to get as many species on slide as I could before I had to leave India and come home to London.
That phase lasted until about 1965, when I had a good number of slides of European butterflies in my “collection” - without of course ever killing one in the process. The essence of my personally newly-discovered “art” was to make the camera show the butterfly better than the eye can see it, and to do it in entirely natural conditions, which meant no additional lighting or funny stuff with stunning butterflies or sticking them on false backgrounds. Nature, pure and simple, was the watchword!
The results were pleasing. Butterfly close-ups being pretty rare in those far-off days, people to whom I showed them, - like Bernard d’Abrera who at that time had more experience of butterflies from behind a camera than any one else - were very encouraging.