Amazing macro photography with SONY RX10-4: Dragonfly (Ruddy darter, Bloedrode heidelibel)

original picture 5472x3648 pixels
SONY RX10-IV. 24mm. f/2.8 1/200 sec ISO250
hand held

cropped to 1000x800 pixels
Sympetrum sanguineum, Ruddy darter, Bloedrode heidelibel ♂

I wanted to try out the macro capabilities of the SONY RX10-iv with a dragonfly. Now, a dragonfly is not the perfect study object, because dragonflies have very good eyes and are easily disturbed and fly away. But a dragonfly is just too beautiful to ignore. 

One advantage is that the dragonfly often returns to the same twig. I used the wide-angle 24 mm position of the lens. I managed to get very close to the insect by moving the camera very slowly towards the head of the dragonfly, taking care not to make sudden movements. The zoom was in the maximum wide angle (24mm) position. In the end the distance to the head must have been a few centimeters (about 3cm). A quick movement of the camera towards the creature will be fatal.  The dragonfly reacts to moving objects. If you don't move, you don't exist.  I removed the lens hood and moved my camera imperceptibly slow towards the creature and it accepted the camera for just long enough to take a few pictures! Success! Perfect! And a surprise.

Fine structure of the eye is visible. (same picture,
cropped to 500x430 pixels).

The eyes and many other features in the pictures are very detailed. I didn't expect this from an all-round general purpose camera like the SONY RX10-iv. But this is a very good result. However, you need a rather sunny day. ISO-settings of 1000 or 400 will not give good results. 

Later I will add a few other pictures. And in a future blog I will compare this result with the telezoom position of the RX10-iv and also to the SONY 90mm macro-lens mounted on the SONY A6400. Have a nice holiday!

Correction: in the previous version I wrote 'lens cap' in stead of 'lens hood'. Of course I removed the lens cap! I removed the lens hood because I could get closer to the dragonfly without disturbing him too much.

 

See also:

Sony RX10 IV Minimum Focus Distance (youtube)