Photographing a spider web

[Ilovebokeh]

Would love to get nice photos of spider webs. I have read various articles, but nothing helps.

Eg.

Great opportunity today. Nice dark contrast background, tripod set up etc.

But I simply cannot see the web through the viewfinder/preview like I can with my eyes.

Any specific tips please?

Thank you

[Tannin]

Good question! I have no answer to it, but have a vaguely related problem: quite often I take what I think is a lovely landscape only to discover, back at home, that there is a damn power line running through the middle of it which I didn't see with the naked eye or through the viewfinder.

[ameerat42]

Would love to get nice photos of spider webs...
But I simply cannot see the web through the viewfinder/preview like I can with my eyes...


Hmm! A rather basic sounding problem!!! I tried to rustle up a few reasons, but...?
Starting from scratch, some Qs:
1. How are you trying to take these pictures? - Some camera settings, perhaps.
2. Are you focusing manually, or using AF?
3. Is the viewfinder dioptre adjustment correct for your eyes? (But then did you use Live View?)
4. Is the angle you have the camera set very different from that of your eyes when looking at the web?
(Sometimes light does not reflect through too much of an angle.)
...
...

[Plays With Light]

For photographing spiderwebs, I always use live view on 10x magnification and manual focusing.

Play with getting the light to reflect off the web as in the following image, but you will notice in this image that the web disappears from sight where it is in shadow, on the right hand side! This requires looking at the web from all manner of angles, until you get those magic sparkles to pop. Try and get a neutral background to set it off from too, if at all possible, which may mean coming back at a different time of the day to achieve this, as I had to do with this shot. You could always cheat and bounce the light from a flash off the web to achieve the same sort of look!
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-L3xB9kT/2/201983eb/XL/i-L3xB9kT-XL.jpg


Golden Orb Weavers spiderwebs show up really well against a nice neutral background.
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-Tc54JxT/2/58b0f1fd/XL/i-Tc54JxT-XL.jpg


Another web, pretty messy this time and occupied by a tiny spider, but the web is shown off fairly well because of the darker background it's set against.
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-Tjv87Qg/2/707a3c69/XL/i-Tjv87Qg-XL.jpg


Another messy web, this time in full midday sunlight and set against some old rusted out machinery.
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-ddmxqLZ/2/1c2dc681/XL/i-ddmxqLZ-XL.jpg


All of these were achieved on a tripod and with live view at 10x magnification, to make sure that my manual focus was correct. Hope that helps you a little.

[farmmax]

Go out early in the morning if you get dew, and catch it full of dew drops. That makes them stand out. If no real dew drops you could try spraying with fine mist of water to create your own drops.

[Ilovebokeh]

For photographing spiderwebs, I always use live view on 10x magnification and manual focusing.

Play with getting the light to reflect off the web as in the following image, but you will notice in this image that the web disappears from sight where it is in shadow, on the right hand side! This requires looking at the web from all manner of angles, until you get those magic sparkles to pop. Try and get a neutral background to set it off from too, if at all possible, which may mean coming back at a different time of the day to achieve this, as I had to do with this shot. You could always cheat and bounce the light from a flash off the web to achieve the same sort of look!
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-L3xB9kT/2/201983eb/XL/i-L3xB9kT-XL.jpg


Golden Orb Weavers spiderwebs show up really well against a nice neutral background.
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-Tc54JxT/2/58b0f1fd/XL/i-Tc54JxT-XL.jpg


Another web, pretty messy this time and occupied by a tiny spider, but the web is shown off fairly well because of the darker background it's set against.
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-Tjv87Qg/2/707a3c69/XL/i-Tjv87Qg-XL.jpg


Another messy web, this time in full midday sunlight and set against some old rusted out machinery.
https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-ddmxqLZ/2/1c2dc681/XL/i-ddmxqLZ-XL.jpg


All of these were achieved on a tripod and with live view at 10x magnification, to make sure that my manual focus was correct. Hope that helps you a little.

This helps me a lot!

Very inspirational plus useful. Seems like I am not getting the right angle to have the correct lighting on the web.

Any preferred settings/time for light for bokeh?

I aim for dawn, but sometimes you can find things at midday when you cannot return later.

- - - Updated - - -


Go out early in the morning if you get dew, and catch it full of dew drops. That makes them stand out. If no real dew drops you could try spraying with fine mist of water to create your own drops.


Good tip. I do this, but still cannot focus. I think I need a better angle to optimise lighting on the web.

I will keep trying.

[Mary Anne]

Manual Focus works for me also..

And I dont use a tripod try hand holding

[ameerat42]

Yendor. By your use of "bokeh" I think you mean "background blur", ie, the separation
of the subject from the BG using image blur. Bokeh means the type of blur the lens can
produce (usu at given f-stops). As an illustration, think of the OOF donut-shapes a mirror
lens produces as its bokeh, compared to the general softness of non-mirror lenses.
Here is a basic definition of the term: https://www.google.com.au/search?q=bokeh&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-ab&gfe_rd=cr&dcr=0&ei=mPu-WYTSFonp8wfowpiQDA
while this one is rather confused and popularised: http://www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-and-explore/a/tips-and-techniques/bokeh-for-beginners.html

[Plays With Light]

This helps me a lot!

Very inspirational plus useful. Seems like I am not getting the right angle to have the correct lighting on the web.

Any preferred settings/time for light for bokeh?

I aim for dawn, but sometimes you can find things at midday when you cannot return later.
It's just a matter of moving around and seeing from which angle you can capture the reflections of the sunlight. Usually, by getting down lower, so you are 180 degrees from the sunlight. This allows you to capture that shimmer at any time of the day really.

Settings? I just noticed with all of these that they visually have a relatively thin DOF to them. So play with that, using larger apertures, which actually means lower aperture numbers, like f/1.8 to f/8. I always try and keep the ISO as low as I can, so the image is as clean as possible.

I think the major thing is to manually focus and to make sure you have as clean a background as you possibly can, so take steps left and right, up and down, to see where you can get that nice background in the frame. It's far easier than trying to soften the background in post-production later on if it's too busy and distracting. With regards to manually focusing, I start off by doing that looking through the viewfinder, once I have the web in focus by eye, I then use the magnification in live view to make sure it's absolute. A big hint when using live view, make a little adjustment, then wait for the camera to not shake, checking whether that made things better or worse, before making another adjustment. Liveview at 10x magnification gets pretty wobbly, showing every vibration. Oh, and I just remembered, I always turn off image stabilisation when I am manually focusing, just so it doesn't accidentally kick in and make your image blurry. If you work from a tripod and use two second delay on your camera, there is no need for image stabilisation at all. Just press the shutter button gently and all vibrations will be gone before the image is taken.


Go out early in the morning if you get dew, and catch it full of dew drops. That makes them stand out. If no real dew drops you could try spraying with fine mist of water to create your own drops.
This is a great suggestion from Max. We don't get dew here, just webs with raindrops, something which I am yet to try and capture. I never thought of his suggestion of misting a web with a spray-bottle!

[Ilovebokeh]

Yendor. By your use of "bokeh" I think you mean "background blur", ie, the separation
of the subject from the BG using image blur. Bokeh means the type of blur the lens can
produce (usu at given f-stops). As an illustration, think of the OOF donut-shapes a mirror
lens produces as its bokeh, compared to the general softness of non-mirror lenses.
Here is a basic definition of the term: https://www.google.com.au/search?q=bokeh&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-ab&gfe_rd=cr&dcr=0&ei=mPu-WYTSFonp8wfowpiQDA
while this one is rather confused and popularised: http://www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-and-explore/a/tips-and-techniques/bokeh-for-beginners.html

Thank you for trying to be helpful. I understand the distinction, but what is your point?

I am sure most understand bokeh as blurred background/ shallow depth of field yes?

[Jimbo48]

I will chuck in my 5 cents worth. I took this photo at Mount Wilson the web was hanging on a gate. I focused on the web had a short depth of field and luckily I had a dark background and the light was on the web. The camera was hand held. I might add I took half a dozen shots and not all turned out so its a bit of trial and error. To me the shot was better when I converted it to black and white.

132396

[ameerat42]

Thank you for trying to be helpful. I understand the distinction, but what is your point?

I am sure most understand bokeh as blurred background/ shallow depth of field yes?

Two Qs:
1. Did you see my first post in this thread?

2. Is your question in the post above your idea of what "most" think "bokeh" means?
If so, I would disagree.

So the point is to try to clear that point up, in the general context of photographing spiders webs.
If confusing, my apologies.

[ricktas]

Thank you for trying to be helpful. I understand the distinction, but what is your point?

I am sure most understand bokeh as blurred background/ shallow depth of field yes?

In a nutshell NO. Bokeh is the quality of the blur. It is that indistinct aspect of the blur that makes it look good/great. Background blur is just that, all photos that have a blurry background can be said to have a blurry background, but only those with a nice creamy, often with indistinct highlight areas can been deemed to have Bokeh. Bokeh is not the blur itself.

[landyvlad]

See what happens on this forum?
You post a perfectly sensible question and people who know what they are doing come along and offer tips, examples and advice.

What IS the world coming to... :)