I know how difficult it can be to get good close-up photos of butterflies and moths.
But at least while you are persevering, you can end up noticing interesting little facets of their behaviour - as you have done already. When watching some blues (long tailed and Lang's short-tailed especially), I am fascinated by the way they rub their hind wings together in a sort of rotating back and forth style (easier to observe than describe). Why do they do that?
Some tips:
- Take photos in late evening or early morning - your subjects will tend to be calmer then, settling down for the night or not quite ready to get up. The air can be calmer at these times, too - making focussing easier and making the insects less flitty. They can be harder to find at these times, of course.
- Stand back and watch for a while: they may have a favourite flower or perch they keep coming back to. If so, you can position yourself there and wait.
- Be mindful of your shadow on the ground/plants. A butterfly can be put to flight by movement of your shadow as much as your body.
- Use as long a working distance as possible. That is, select lenses such that the distance between the front of the lens and the subject is as long as possible. That makes it a bit easier to approach your subject close enough. That can mean more expensive lenses / lens accessories (eg. extension tubes). And because of the greater distances, camera shake is more of a problem - so flash techniques will probably need to be employed. The macro mode on most digital compact cameras unfortunately requires you to get ridiculously close to the subject (OK for flowers and less animate subjects). And at those close ranges, an on-camera flash won't be much good because the lens will cast a shadow over the subject.
- Consider aperture. The smaller the aperture (f22 is smaller than f8, eg.), the greater the depth of field (depth in the subject that is in focus). Greater depth of field is often desirable in close-ups of insects and other invertebrates because the subjects have significant depth. You can effectively reduce that depth by positioning yourself so you are looking 'square on' to the interesting part. eg. if a moth is resting with its wings flat against a wall, move your camera so it is pointing at right angles to the wall.
- However... a smaller aperture means less light reaching the sensor/film. As a consequence, exposure time will be longer - giving more chance of blurring because of movement of the subject and/or camera shaking. It is a trade-off.
- However... With digital cameras you can select the sensitivity (with film cameras, you can't really mess with the film speed). So you can select a small aperture (good) and fast exposure time (good) if you set a high speed (often seen as an ISO number). The downside then is that at high speeds, the images become grainy/noisy.
- If you use flash, you are effectively using a fast exposure. And you can do that with a small aperture and slow film speed because at close quarters, you get a great intensity from the flash. Flash can look artificial unless done well (eg. using fill-flash techniques), and can be tricky to set-up for close-ups. So - no free lunch, but at least there are controls giving you some flexibility.
- If things conspire against you (making it too difficult to get enough of your subject in focus), consider going for a different approach - using shallow depth of field to isolate a feature of interest, eg. feathery antennae.
- Be patient and persevering, and wish for good luck!
