It’s an entirely manual lens and can be very tricky to use. Most macro lenses can achieve a magnification of x1 but the specialist lens I used can provide magnification of up to x5. I used a full-frame Canon R5 camera (that produces a high resolution file that can be readily enlarged) and a Canon MP-E 65mm macro lens. In order to achieve the magnification presented in the exhibition’s printed image (around 400 times life size) some specialist macro kit was required.
After I found the slime mould I set up the equipment to photograph it. The sporangia in my photograph are very small and are around 1mm high, growing on a piece of decaying wood in my ‘slime mould farm’. Slime moulds are not considered fungi by the way, but are classified within the group Protista. I think this is because the single-celled organisms have plenty of food – microorganisms that live in dead and decaying plant matter so have not been triggered into aggregating. I have a ‘slime mould farm’ in the garden that consists of a small pile of twigs and logs that I keep damp and in the shade, but even then ‘photogenic’ fruiting bodes seldom occur. The sporangia are usually very small, and can take some finding.
They can detect food sources and can ‘shape shift’ and readily change the shape and function of the parts of their aggregation and can form stalks that support fruiting bodies – sporangia – that produce spores. When food is in short supply these single-celled organisms will congregate and start moving and behaving as a single body. Their life-cycle includes a free-living single-celled stage, almost like an amoeba or a bacterium. I’ve had a few emails/messages asking me how I achieved the photograph and I was asked about the process in person at the exhibition opening in Walpole Park, too. First, let me say how knocked-out and delighted I am to have my photograph of the sporangia (a posh word for fruiting bodies) of a slime mould take first place in the Up Close and Personal category of Ealing Wildlife Group’s photography 2022 competition.
0 kommentar(er)
