Sheerness Scorpions photographed.

Hi everyone. I took a "spur of the moment" trip down to Sheerness Docks the other night in search of the Yellow-Tailed Scorpions. I'm pleased to announce that I was able to find three scorpions on the High Street wall that surrounds the docks. It took me about 90 minutes of searching the wall but they are there. What surprised me is despite the cool temperatures all three of these scorpions were actively roaming the wall and not hidden away in the crevices as I suspected would be the case.They obviously don't mind the cold. I think they are fascinating to watch. The body length was about an inch so with the pincers and tail I guess they were just under 2 inches long.
I've never seen a scorpion under UV light before and I was amazed just how well they glow. It's such a bright turquoise colour that they are very easy to spot roaming at night once the UV torch is on them. They seem very chilled out too and none of them showed any aggression even when handled.
I've been photographing one of them at home over the weekend. Here are the best of the shots that I've been able to take:


















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As expected.. the quality from a professional..

All are amazing shots!

#6 and #7 display total crisp in sharpness.

Click here to view:

#9 and #10 are breath taking with the mirror effects!

Click here to view:

These are indeed the best black-light shots i have seen so far.

Thanks for posting theses up and i'll be awaiting more of your works Jason

Bummer that the "stinger" is gone.

Thanks very much for your highly flattering comments GS. I was pleased how ell these came out considering how small the scorpions are. There won't be any more shots for a while though as my wife was keen for me to get the scorpions out of our house as quickly as possible. She definitely doesn't share our passion for such creatures. I'll have to make another trip when the weather warms up a bit and my wife goes to visit her parents for the week! lol


Here are the photography details for anyone interested:

Camera: Canon 40D
Lens: Canon 100mm f/2.8 IS L Macro
Flash unit: Canon 580ex
External lighting: 2 x PhotoSel 500W softboxes
Tripod: Velbon Sherpa Pro Carbon Fibre CF530 with Velbon QHD-61Q head.

UV lit shots:
Manual Exposure and manual focus:
ISO 1600,
Aperture: f/11
Shutter Speed: 1/4 second.

Softbox lit shots:
AV Mode:
ISO 800,
Aperture: f/13
Shutter Speed: 1/40 second.


Jason

Congratulations on finding them and wow they're some great pictures.

I really like what you have done to show where the scorpions are found, with the smaller picture inset into the pic of the wall and as GS said, the pictures of the scorpion under the UV light are stunning.

Looks like you have collected a male with the tip of his aculeus broken off. Are you going to keep him?

Thanks Callum. No, the scorpions are gone already I'm afraid. My wife would never allow me to keep them unfortunately.

Jason

jaySteel wrote:

Thanks Callum. No, the scorpions are gone already I'm afraid. My wife would never allow me to keep them unfortunately.

Jason

Time to get another then?

very nice pics, need to take a trip up there again soon

Thanks Bex. I might have to visit again soon as well.

wow! amazing, now i want to TRY and take half as amazing photos of my scorpions.thanks for sharing you inspired me to dig out my big camera and start shooting again

Thanks very much sp1int3r. I hope you have great success with your shots.

Jason

these shots are so great they will make a good calendar

can i borrow these pics for my computer class?


mike