when I first started the project I
started at home first specimens are
photographs my boy it caught me in the
garden the macro photography suited my
working lifestyle at the time my
commercial work is portrait photography
essentially but I specialized in sport I
travel quite a lot so I needed a project
that would always be there every time I
came back from a trip and also I didn’t
have a huge amount of space so I needed
to shoot something small I wanted to see
how I could take my commercial
techniques of lighting into that world
initially Levon came to us and he had
some photographs of people’s and flies
and these kind of things and they looked
amazing and then I showed him the files
on the computer I went sumit into the
picture zooming into the picture zooming
into the picture until he saw the detail
in the images I was immediately blown
away by them at the way they were lit
and the incredible amount of detail it
was in the images but I thought well
there are some other things that would
look even better this is the second
largest insect collection in Britain
these ones here all dotted down the side
and the specimens had to be interesting
shapes or colors not too big not too
small clean or cleanable in the tiniest
amounts of dirt picked up in the
photographs we probably rejected about
99% of the museum’s collection I had
trouble finding one of those that wasn’t
broken
I’ll see you in a month it’s a real
privilege for me to be playing with
these things and it’s very trusting of
the museum to lend me them working and
shooting with microscope lenses turns a
traditional photography process upside
down for example I’ll just photograph an
antenna and I’ll light that and tonight
so it looks the best as it possibly can
once I move on to the next section
for example the eye the light will
change completely and work my way across
the whole body of the insect until I end
up with 30 different sections each
photograph individually work with
microscope lenses inherently gives you a
very very shallow depth of field and
therefore we have to take many many
pictures so I’ll program my closest
focal point and then I’ll program my
focal point that’s furthest away so the
camera will then move forward on the
rail automatically take a picture and
then move forward again ten microns to
give you an idea of how far that is the
average hair on a human head is 75
microns so most my final image is made
up of somewhere between eight and ten
thousand images once I have those images
I then process them through various
techniques and flatten them down so I
have one sharp image so from the start
of the process of photograph the insect
to the final image is anywhere between
two and three weeks work James and the
museum were excited to see these
pictures I don’t think they’ve seen
anything quite like them before
certainly not at this scale and not in
this amount of detail now when I saw an
entomologist excited about these images
and they see a lot of pictures of
insects
you know anyways onto a good thing
it was obvious that they had to be
exhibited somehow this exhibition will
allow people to see part of the museum’s
collection that they wouldn’t normally
see and it also allows people to
experience the collection in a new way
for the micro sculpture project I’ll
have around 25 images and they could be
printed large I’m feeling excited but a
wee bit nervous
to see the first one after two years
coming off this science it’s great the
exhibition is going to be a special
experience for me I’ve got to know these
little creatures quite well I’ve looked
every single part of them for many many
hours and to see them up being enjoyed
by the public could be a nice experience
that is one big insect look at detail in
there
I just can’t believe how this image has
come out the colors the saturation the
vibrancy I’ve never seen anything like
that before
you see these structures you see lots of
diesel and think that wire insects like
that I hope that the exhibition will
inspire future generations of
entomologists to discover these things
and come up with some more answers I’m
nervous I’m excited to see the reaction
from this so see the actual specimens
themselves and then their their
photograph at that size hopefully will
be a unique experience whether the
exhibition will be the end of this
project I don’t know I’ve got a feeling
it might only get a start
you
started at home first specimens are
photographs my boy it caught me in the
garden the macro photography suited my
working lifestyle at the time my
commercial work is portrait photography
essentially but I specialized in sport I
travel quite a lot so I needed a project
that would always be there every time I
came back from a trip and also I didn’t
have a huge amount of space so I needed
to shoot something small I wanted to see
how I could take my commercial
techniques of lighting into that world
initially Levon came to us and he had
some photographs of people’s and flies
and these kind of things and they looked
amazing and then I showed him the files
on the computer I went sumit into the
picture zooming into the picture zooming
into the picture until he saw the detail
in the images I was immediately blown
away by them at the way they were lit
and the incredible amount of detail it
was in the images but I thought well
there are some other things that would
look even better this is the second
largest insect collection in Britain
these ones here all dotted down the side
and the specimens had to be interesting
shapes or colors not too big not too
small clean or cleanable in the tiniest
amounts of dirt picked up in the
photographs we probably rejected about
99% of the museum’s collection I had
trouble finding one of those that wasn’t
broken
I’ll see you in a month it’s a real
privilege for me to be playing with
these things and it’s very trusting of
the museum to lend me them working and
shooting with microscope lenses turns a
traditional photography process upside
down for example I’ll just photograph an
antenna and I’ll light that and tonight
so it looks the best as it possibly can
once I move on to the next section
for example the eye the light will
change completely and work my way across
the whole body of the insect until I end
up with 30 different sections each
photograph individually work with
microscope lenses inherently gives you a
very very shallow depth of field and
therefore we have to take many many
pictures so I’ll program my closest
focal point and then I’ll program my
focal point that’s furthest away so the
camera will then move forward on the
rail automatically take a picture and
then move forward again ten microns to
give you an idea of how far that is the
average hair on a human head is 75
microns so most my final image is made
up of somewhere between eight and ten
thousand images once I have those images
I then process them through various
techniques and flatten them down so I
have one sharp image so from the start
of the process of photograph the insect
to the final image is anywhere between
two and three weeks work James and the
museum were excited to see these
pictures I don’t think they’ve seen
anything quite like them before
certainly not at this scale and not in
this amount of detail now when I saw an
entomologist excited about these images
and they see a lot of pictures of
insects
you know anyways onto a good thing
it was obvious that they had to be
exhibited somehow this exhibition will
allow people to see part of the museum’s
collection that they wouldn’t normally
see and it also allows people to
experience the collection in a new way
for the micro sculpture project I’ll
have around 25 images and they could be
printed large I’m feeling excited but a
wee bit nervous
to see the first one after two years
coming off this science it’s great the
exhibition is going to be a special
experience for me I’ve got to know these
little creatures quite well I’ve looked
every single part of them for many many
hours and to see them up being enjoyed
by the public could be a nice experience
that is one big insect look at detail in
there
I just can’t believe how this image has
come out the colors the saturation the
vibrancy I’ve never seen anything like
that before
you see these structures you see lots of
diesel and think that wire insects like
that I hope that the exhibition will
inspire future generations of
entomologists to discover these things
and come up with some more answers I’m
nervous I’m excited to see the reaction
from this so see the actual specimens
themselves and then their their
photograph at that size hopefully will
be a unique experience whether the
exhibition will be the end of this
project I don’t know I’ve got a feeling
it might only get a start
you
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