Photographing Centipedes?

Ganoderma

Arachnobaron
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 24, 2006
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467
maybe this is obvious, to me it isnt. i did a search on this forum and came up empty handed.

im trying to get pictures of my centipedes and needless to say its becoming quite a chore. when they are out i go for my camera. but they are so damn fast that its almost impossible for me to get the shot. even with fast shutterspeed the light needs to be really good and i have found glare to be a problem. any tricks and tips?

also there is teh matter of safety. ive seen some pretty incredible macros of centipedes and im betting people did not kill the animal to get it. soooooo, how can i go about getting the good close ups while keeping safe. or am i asking too much?

any tips are GREATLY appreciated!

that said here is my only picture worth using, and its rather umm...ya. any idea what species? from taiwan, lol. i can get better pics if i can figure out how to get them :? :D
 

Steven

pede-a-holic
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Feb 18, 2003
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where's the picture ? :?

and about the photography,...
yes,.... you're asking to much :p :p :p ;)

it's a matter of having patience and wait untill the scolopendrid just doesn't care about you and the cam in your hand. :D

i usually just lift the hidingplace where it's under and hope it stays in the same place as before :rolleyes:
 

danread

Arachnoprince
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Dec 5, 2002
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I find that feeding the pede before photographing is the best way to get them to stay in one place. Once the pede is eating, you can usually guarantee that it won't move much, and will often completely ignore having a lens a few cm from it.

The other option is to invest in a decent dSLR with a medium telephoto macro lens, say a 100mm macro. That way you can get a good working distance between the camera lens and the subject. Of course this isn't cheap!

Cheers,
 

crashergs

Arachnobaron
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Jan 20, 2006
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hey gano... well its relativley easy to photograph a pede, the only thing you need to consider is the angle of the photograph and using rule of thirds, so you can get the angle of the pede and its background. I created a terrarium, so I can photograph the pede and the background will be real plants and vine stump, when I use a low aperature, it looks like i took it in the wild, since you can hardly see the background (it will blurr). sometimes pedes will stop and groom themselves or stop for unknown reason, thats your time to snap a picture, i do mine fairly quick, i always have my camera right beside me. I have a digital rebel on AUTO ON, so once i pick it up, i press the shutter button an snap.
You can feed your pede to take a shot, but depends on you iff you always want a shot with the pede eating. i have pictures in (terrarium for vietnamese) thread u can see those as an example, many people here have good pictures

I kinda think its starting to be more of an art form, since its rather complicated considering you might get bit for a very close up shot, and since you rarely see them.
 

cacoseraph

ArachnoGod
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Jan 5, 2005
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cents also tend to be slower in the morning (if there isa nighttime drop in temp)
even after they are done eating, while like, digesting, i think they are sort of slower too

but when they are eating you can do sort of silly stuff and get away with it a large % of the time
if my computer/internet connection didn't suck so bad, i could show you a pick of me holding a E. trigonopodus while it's munchin a cricket
 

Galapoheros

ArachnoGod
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Jul 4, 2005
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You could take the centipede out and put it in a container with packed peat or something that looks good. Something it would have to work hard to dig through. Maybe put something in the middle it could get under, slowly lift and take a pic. I don't have a real good camera. I usually use the flash. If I don't, I put the camera on a stand that I found. I'm one of those people that will pick them up (depending on the pede). Not a good idea I suppose. But really a bad idea if they scare you. Funny how our brains work like that (or mine, hehe). It's kind of like the stock market. If you're real scared to lose money in the stock market, you increase your chances of losing money in the market. You're expecting it. Well, got off there. If I want to take a pede pic and can't see the pede, I might take it out and put it in a "photo shoot" container.
 

Ganoderma

Arachnobaron
Old Timer
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Jan 24, 2006
Messages
467
ohh ok excellent. thanks for the tips, i think i will try som feeding pics (it ran away from the last roach...).

sadly enough that was a photo bucket...it chose the only spot with no background and plain sand to stop....:rolleyes:

thanks again.
 
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