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Autumn Love.


Autumn Love.
Photo Information
Copyright: Peter Stoeckl (peter_stoeckl) Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1629 W: 287 N: 3647] (10221)
Genre: Animals
Medium: Color
Date Taken: 2006-09-23
Categories: Insects
Camera: Sony Cybershot DSC-H5
Photo Version: Final Version, Original Version, Workshop
Theme(s): European Butterflies 7 [view contributor(s)]
Date Submitted: 2006-10-01 17:59
Viewed: 1401
Favorites: 1 [view]
Points: 24
[Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note
Autumn Love.

Colias erate (Esper, 1804),
Eastern Pale Clouded Yellow.

Family: Pieridae.

Wingspan: 40 - 45mm.

Saturday, September 23, 2006, the first day of Autumn: clear, sunny, windy, and pleasantly warm.

As told in the notes of my previous posting, good numbers of yellow and white butterflies were quickly flying around all over the place on a rocky barren limestone hill to the east of Vienna.

These butterflies were hard to follow, and hard to capture. Very soon I decided to give up running up and down the hill like a fool, and I decided to have a relaxing walk on a narrow path leading uphill through the scrubs. Lucky idea: after just a few minutes of pleasant walk I discovered a copulating pair of Colias erate - the Eastern Clouded Yellow - dangling down from a twig right in front of me.

I remember our TN member Sabine to have written in a critique a few days ago that these Yellows all look very much the same, how should we tell the numerous different species from each other.

Sabine is definitely right, the genus Colias does look a bit confusing. Sometimes, only the males look different, as between C. hyale and C. erate, and females look pretty much the same. Sometimes, even the butterflies no matter which sex look very much the same, and only the caterpillars look distinctly different - as between C. hyale and C. alfacariensis.

To make things even more difficult, C. erate shows unstable pattern and coloration. Some times, males can be seen showing bright freckles in the black border of upperside of wings that makes them look very similar to C. hyale: a variation called

"Colias erate f. hyaloides (Groum-Grshimailo)".

Such a male seems to be making love here being the one on top. Only because of the location and all the other typical C. erate butterflies around I am rather convinced to have captured Colias erate here.

Colias erate is a typical inhabitant of the "steppe", Southeastern European grassland. Furthermore, the species is reported from temperate Asia to Japan, and south to Somalia and Abessinia.


Literature:

C.Jonko: Butterflies and Moths of Europe: http://www.lepidoptera.bai.pl/


Camera:

SONY DSC-H5, 3072 x 2304 pixel, sRGB, 18mm, F/4, 1/640 sec., ISO-125; no tripod, no flash; 23.09.2006, 15:15.

Postwork: Photoshop Elements, slightly cropped, downsized to the web, sharpened, selective noise reduction, contrast and luminance adjusted, BG slightly cleaned.


>>>

Thank you for all the friendly and useful critiques I received on my original posting. Reading your critiques, and reviewing the image I sent, the rather poor technical quality of that image now obvious to me made me try a repost, taking another image from the same series, with the same difficult but challenging backlight, and hopefully with much clearer details on the main objects.

>>>


Hope you enjoy. Thank you for looking.
Have a very good start of the week.
nainnain, red45, RAP, scottevers7, Merlin, dew77, eruyanik, XOTAELE, Pentaxfriend, Christopher_PL has marked this note useful
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Discussions
ThreadThread Starter Messages Updated
To eruyanik: these lemonies ...peter_stoeckl 1 10-03 07:02
To jmp: butterflies and backgroundpeter_stoeckl 1 10-03 02:13
To Merlin: the female is making the male do all the work :)peter_stoeckl 2 10-02 12:16
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Critiques [Translate]

bravo pourcette capture aux détails excellents, couleurs ravissantes et nettes
amicalement
EDIYH

  • Great 
  • red45 Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 2705 W: 74 N: 8864] (30243)
  • [2006-10-02 1:27]

Hi Peter!

It is big surprise that some creatures want to make love during this sad times ;-) Very nice moment, composition and POV. I like blue BG and backlight. Note is as always real gem to read.

hi peter
magnifique,au moins ils y en a qui ne se genent pas!!!
tres joli avec la lumiere qui les traverse.tout simplement super.
laurent

  • Great 
  • RAP Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 2524 W: 345 N: 2373] (7405)
  • [2006-10-02 8:18]

Estimado Peter... esta imagen mantiene el charme de la original, pero con una mejor resolución del fondo algo conflictivo que se apreciaba en aquella.
Buena elección para el RP.
Mis mejores saludos... Ricardo

Dear Peter... this image maintains the charme of the original, but with a better resolution of the bottom something conflicting that was appreciated in that.
Good election for RP.
My best regards... Ricardo

Hi Peter,
A very nice shot on this pair of Pale Clouded Yellows. Nice frame filling composition with sharp detail. What really makes the shot is the back lighting coming thru the wings. Great job to get that difficult exposure.
Scott

Helo again, Peter
I will leave the subtleties of Colias ID to you - I find that there are often more variations between specimens than between species ;) This is a very subtle and attractive image - it looks like the female is making the male do all the work ;) I've tried a quick workshop on the image - I'm not sure if it's much of an improvement..
Best wishes, Nigel.

  • Great 
  • dew77 Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 4774 W: 294 N: 4020] (13209)
  • [2006-10-02 12:46]

Hello Peter,
Former one was also wonderful but i think this one is better.
Great use of backlight.POV,details and composition are excellent.
Have a nice week too!
TFS...:-)

Hi Peter,
You posted a different work with this beautiful butterflies! Really a challenging work with that hard backlit. i really like that backlit effect some parts on the wings and shadow of the body on the wings:-) These lemonies has beautiful green eyes! On the bg interesting sky blue which not disturbing and beautiful greens. pov and vertical framing worked very well. btw, i like your original post too! You are really lucky man my friend, i'm admiring your trips on the Alpines:-) But ok, i know this one is from a hill in Vienna:-) Great post with great infos as usual from you.
Thank you and best regards,
Ersin

  • Great 
  • jmp Gold Star Critiquer/Gold Star Workshop Editor/Gold Note Writer [C: 1740 W: 95 N: 2273] (8411)
  • [2006-10-02 16:03]
  • [+]

Hi Peter,
WordReference.com translates the spanish sentence "sobre gustos no hay nada escrito" as "there's no accounting for taste". Well, I prefer the first post for the reason I wrote down there. In any case, this a very good portrait that lets see better butterflies and worse the lovely background.
Best regard my friend.
José Miguel

Hermosos colores los de estas mariposas y que has sabido plasmar.
Perfectos detalles. La mariposa que se encuentra en la parte inferior parece reflejada como en un espejo.
Felicitaciones por tus dos trabajos tan bien hechos.
JL.

Hi Peter,

SUPERB shot of this happy couple.
Perfect sharpness , details and composition
Great POV, DOF and note

TFS Thijs

Hi Peter
Really good capture. I've never seen picture of this species matting. Good colours and sharpness. TFS

Chris

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