but I don't really like the subject!!! Hornets (along with Yellowjackets, Wasps, etc) are not my most favorite of creatures roaming the earth. Nice job on the Macro side of things though.

Hi Joe,

I like this shot because of the macro quality and the subject. My wife is from Poland and I've heard about the European Hornet. We also have the Zuiko 50mm. I just posted a shot of a common frog this week (you should be able to find it on the main page). I took three shots, each time getting closer and closer. The one I posted was the final shot and I cropped just a tiny bit to center it more. It doesn't seem very "macro"...but yours does and it's a hornet! My questions is (which I have for many people who do photos of insects with this lens) did you do any cropping? If you didn't, congratulations on getting close to a resting hornet! In some insect photos, the insects could be dead for all I know. I'm also wondering if you took a bunch of shots and if you chose the 2.2 aperture just to get the eyes.
Nice photo...thanks for sharing!

Adam

Thanks for your comments Adam,
I like your frog photo. Great detail and well composed. Nice colors too.

This photo was cropped from an original shot that showed the whole body. It's been magnified to the extent that graininess can be seen even at ISO 100. The reason I used f 2.2 was because the light was very limited as I was working in a deeply shaded place under some shrubs. I wanted to use the low ISO because I knew that I would be enlarging and cropping.

I don't plan to pursue any other hornet photos. The hornets became very agitated and started buzzing around my head several time in a very threatening manner. I was lucky not to have gotten stung.

I used the 2X Olympus extension tube with the 50mm and positioned the lens about six inches from where the hornets were working. Normally I would have used the 40-150 lens but my goal was to get as much closeup detail as possible. The image was viewed in the LCD live screen and manually focused for each shot. I fired the shutter with the finger release button. I would say that probably 75 percent of the pictures I took were out-of-focus.

amazing quality considering the circumstances! Fantastic result!