Gazania

[kds315*]

Gazania, a flower which starts to more and more fascinate me, especially since I do that "strange stuff" as some might call that [UV, Fluorescence, Bee Vision, IR,...] .... have a look if that does touch you.

There is so much beauty outside that world that we humans think we know all about ... we just don't have the senses for (well, some do).

Shot using off the shelf D70, modified to Nikon Noflexar X35mm lens, UV High Power Xenon Flash lamp.

#1 VIS shot:


#2 UV shot using Baader-U filter (310-390nm):


#3 UV shot using slightly blue leaking UG filter:


#4 "Bee Vision" Filter XBV2 shot (i.e. UV+VIS):


#5 UV induced visible Fluorescence shot using XCUT2 filter (400-650nm):


#6 IR Filter shot using B+W 092 filter (>675nm):


... and YESSSS, all shot using a purely MF lens, even the exposure was set manually and the flash is also unregulated....but no, no black cloth over my head while I take pics and no wet collodium used

*** EDIT ***

Guess I owe you a bit more detailled explanaition about that "Bee Vision" thing.

Bees have in contrary to us humans a special receptor in their eye which has a UV sensitivity which peaks around 360nm (UV-A). They also have a blue and green sensitive receptor - quite similar to what we have. So we more or less share these two receptors. The red receptor we have, the bees don't have ---> Bees don't see red. So in short:
Human: B, G, R
Bee: UV, B, G

Now some years ago I started to be fascinated by the idea, how it would look like, if we humans had the ability to see UV and if I could find a method to simulate that. Well, but we can't see UV, so a method to "map" this sensititvity into our 400-700nm range.

Therefore I usually took two shots, a visible (VIS) one: B+G+R plus a pure UV shot using a narrowband filter (310-390nm), so as to have all the needed information to simulate "Bee Vision" [there is more differences than that of course, but for now lets stay with that one difference only for the sake of simplicity...].

So pixelwise combining these two shots #1 + #2 (quite a cumbersome process if you think about wind, changing filters, movement of the setup etc. [*]) into one resulting image should give the wanted "Bee Vision". In principle two mappings make sense:
1) UV-->Blue, B-->Green, G-->Red which is like a "transposition" in music, but has the disadvantage that the colors we and the bees can see (Blue, Green) change for us into (Green, Red)
2) UV-->Red, B-->Blue, G-->Green which is using the "unused" red channel, has the advantage that the colors we and the bees can see (Blue, Green) stay the same, but for me it knacks in my head since it collides with teh "Bees can't see red" axiom and UV is a short wavelength like blue, no long like red.
3) UV-->Violet/Blue, B-->Blue, G->Green and R-->Red is the one I mostly use, since that works together with our expectations, "our" visible colors remain the same. (With blue flowers (esp. having an UV pattern) it won't work well obviously.) Next step would be to match the "Bees don't see Red" axiom, by suppressing the red channel of the resulting image. [But sometimes I don't do that last step, as in #4]
[*] I have now invented a specilized filter with allows to do all that with just one shot #4, so eliminates all that cumbersome process of having to shoot two identical images - called XBV filter

[luisalegria]

Complately fascinating series !

One would have to say its the "bee vision" issue that has caused this unusual pattern in UV ? Its the bees that are an evolutionary factor.

[patrickh]

Love #4
All are amazing.


patrickh

[kds315*]

Thanks Guys!

[Carlsson]

Great!
Thanks for the look into a new, very fascinating world of macro Klaus.
And thanks too for the deep explanation, it helps to understand the world of UV photography.

Btw., I love your blog!

[piticu]

Klaus, can you disclose any details about your invention - XBV filter?

[kds315*]

Thanks again, I hope it gave a bit insight about what I current resaearch on!

@Cezar: not for the time being, maybe at a later stage.

[Spotmatic]

Extraordinary work, Klaus. I like it when uncommon things are done to get a better understanding of how animal/insect vision works. Of course, this is our interpretation because we do not know exactly how the bee brain sees its subject, isn't it? Imagine a field full of flowers, how exactly would a bee see it with its relatively coarse faceted eyes?

[Spotmatic]

Klaus, I just stumbled across the photos on your Flickr account. Great stuff!

[kds315*]

[kds315*]

[LucisPictor]

This is definitely is ART! Wow!

[kds315*]

Thanks Carsten,

I try to accomplish both actually: scienece + art!

Cheers,

[Laurence]

I can't express how impressed I am with your fantastic use of light! Extraordinary!

[kds315*]

Thanks Laurence!!

[kds315*]