Thursday, August 4, 2011

A Change of Pace

After sleeping the day away while under the weather, I needed a bit of sunlight and fresh air. I didn't go far, just up the road, and came upon this male Blue Dasher, Pachydiplax longipennis, a skimmer of the Libellulidae family. Such marvelous complexity and beauty in a little package.



6 comments:

  1. Nature may not "do" a lot of blue here in New England, but when she/he does, it is gloriously beautiful; just look at those eyes! I love the lighting in this photo, too.
    Sorry to hear you haven't been feeling well- hope you are better asap!
    ~ gretchen

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  2. Thanks, Gretchen. It seems that every year about this time... Wonder if it's allergies.

    Aren't those eyes something? I love the closeup world of insects!

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  3. It was those beautiful eyes that really caught me too. Great macro, John.

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  4. Thanks, Judith. :-)

    A little fact on those compound eyes: A dragonfly has 30,000 ommatidia in each eye. Wow...

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  5. hi john, wow---loved your photo!! may want to use that someday. i've been trying to work on portrait but more company this week. i feel sick ,also...i get fall allergies starting around now so that could be it. drags me down. heading upstairs to work on panel right now. i took a shot of libby and the pose is similar to girl with the pearl earring so i'm going to copy the clothing of vermeer but put in libby's face. sound too corny? hee hee.we'll give it a whirl and see what the muse delivers. miss you john-wish we shared a studio so i could pick your tech. brain and you could pick my paint brain. don't worry so much about the egg...after a while it is visual in the mixing consistency and you can just look at the drop of egg and know it is right...dorothy

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  6. Hi Dorothy!

    Vermeer? Way cool!!! I think it will look awesome! Ya, miss you too. Soon enough I will be over to visit. We will have to talk to Koo about more local classes. Venice will be so wonderful for you, I am sure.

    I am getting much closer with my egg mixes. I notice differences with pigments. Umber seems to like a lighter mix while green earth wants more. Just observations as I am painting, so I need to get into real studies.

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