Seeing in a Different LightHow do dragonflies see their world?

Halloween Pennant dragonflies just seem to light up when photographed using flash. They literally glow. Not sure why this is. Perhaps it is the reflections off the wings, how they are folded, or their color. The stigmas--located on the leading edge of the wing towards the wingtip--seem to burn especially bright, like landing lights on an airplane. I wonder how other dragonflies--which can see across a wider spectrum of light than we can--view each other? It must be a spectacular world....

Equipment Setup

• Canon 5D
• Canon 300mm + 1.4x teleconverter
• Canon 430EX II flash
• ISO: 320, f-stop: f10, Shutter: 1/320 sec.

Scenario

To get shot, I set up using the equipment above and concentrated on a twig that the Halloween Pennant seemed to prefer. (Other dragonflies were using it as well.) Usually I use a -1 f-stop compensation on the flash, but didn't in this instance as I really wanted to capture the glow of the wings. I specifically chose a distant background across the pond consisting mostly of trees and some sky. That selection added additional color to the photo and contrasted nicely with the dragonfly's wings.

Nature Notes

Dragonflies, such as this Halloween Pennant, often patrol territories and often hang out of favorite perches to rest and watch for both prey and other male pennants (which they chase away) or interested females (with which to breed).

Halloween Pennants often perch on the tips of twigs, as this one is doing, where they swing back and forth in the breeze, hence their name "pennant". The Halloween part of their name comes from their colors of orange and black (or brown).