WASP



Wasp, photo by Harold Davis. View the wasp larger.

A WASP used to be slightly derogatory term for a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Today it’s just an insect, a wasp without the upper-case letters.

This one was torpid on our living room ceiling. It took some contortions on my part to get my tripod close enough to take this picture, as you can see in this photo Phyllis took of me in my pajamas photographing the wasp with my tripod raised up using diaper cartons:

There are many kinds of wasps, and I’d appreciate any help identifying this one.

This Post Has 7 Comments

  1. well, Harold – I had to laugh at that second photo – the contortions we go through to grab a serendipitous photo! I’m glad the diaper cartons held up under the weight of you, your tripod and your camera! That would have been a nasty fall. Nice photo you got, too! Wow! Did you have a light on the wasp? How did you get such crisp detail? Good thing it was sleepy/torpid and unperturbable…
    Maureen

  2. Hi Maureen – Thanks for the comment, yes I felt like a human photographer pretzel!

    I just use the ambient light from the morning (overcast but bright). No doubt, the overall white paint in the room helped. I used a 105mm macro with a 35mm extension tube, stopped down to f/32, for the photo – sharp optics. Also, I applying a couple of sharpening filters in Photoshop, the unsharp mask overall, and then smart sharpen just on the Wasp!

    Best – Harold

  3. Stunning image Harold. Pin sharp.

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