Glowing Flower Spider?

[Lumen Miner (Mitchell)]

Hi all!
Last week at night while shooting some macro, I downloaded the images and noticed something irredescent in the corner of a frame. It seemed to be "glowing" green of it's own accord. I didn't notice anything visually glowing whilst scouting for bugs, so I can only assume it has something to do with the flash shooting through it's green skin (do you call it skin on a spider?) and radiating through the white patterns on its back.

Last night I worked out what it was. A Flower spider is the closest identification I can find. David referred to it as possibly a Lynx spider, from a previous image.
I am sure people like David have seen this before, but it has me amazed.

This is not a blown out abdomen, which would not produce a green tinge. If it was blown out it would produce a white glow.

I have tryed Googling the subject of "glowing" spiders, but have not had any luck.

To illustrate this a little better, I knocked the curves down in several steps then made a short video out of the frames. The was done in PP, not manually on the camera. Although I could have down it that way also.

Please check it out. It's only a small download, maybe 30secs on 56k.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGhW5usURNM


Incase you are wondering, I chose to put only the tips of the legs in focus. I am sure alot would hate this shot, yet we all know what a flower spider's face looks like. I was going for something a little more..... well I don't know that's just how I pictured the framing and focus, was going to go for this shot.


Thanks for looking.

[troypiggo (Troy)]

Interesting. I know they can change their colour depending on the colour flower they're on to help camouflage, but haven't heard or noticed any luminescence. I wonder if it's related to the colour changing - like, maybe the higher the luminescence the whiter they look, or they can drop down the glow to look more yellow?

[Lumen Miner (Mitchell)]

Originally Posted by troypiggo

Interesting. I know they can change their colour depending on the colour flower they're on to help camouflage, but haven't heard or noticed any luminescence. I wonder if it's related to the colour changing - like, maybe the higher the luminescence the whiter they look, or they can drop down the glow to look more yellow?

Yes, I am still pondering it...

1. It's not "glowing" of it's own accord.

2. A correctly exposed shot, does not "luminate", it appears white.

3. I only get the glow when I accidentally (or purposefully like this), under expose the shot.


I am assuming it appears to be "glowing", beacuse an under exposed shot predominantly picks up on its white abdomen. Due to that, I believe the white abdomen appears green because of the refracting light of it's green skin.

The only thing stumping me, is that it is a light green spider, not that rich darker luminescence green, seen in the shots.



I will get out there tonight and try to get the "glow" from another angle.
Perhaps that would lead to more answers.

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Here's the interesting thing Mitchell (and Troy and anyone else that's interested) - flower spiders, aka Thomsiidae species, aka crab spiders, do actually glow in the UV range I believe. I'd be very very surprised if you caught this on film though Mitchell.

Dave

[Lumen Miner (Mitchell)]

Originally Posted by dpastern

Here's the interesting thing Mitchell (and Troy and anyone else that's interested) - flower spiders, aka Thomsiidae species, aka crab spiders, do actually glow in the UV range I believe. I'd be very very surprised if you caught this on film though Mitchell.

Dave

I was thinking that exact thing 5 minutes ago.
No, you are right I did not catch, nor could you catch the UV glow on standard equipment, I think?

Do you mean they emit a UV glow, or they would be fluorescent under a UV light?

I have a blacklight, so I might try some shots. I am positive under UV, they would glow brite white not green.

I think what I am doing is just a result, of light cast and refraction from the skin.

Though my lighting setup is a tad unusual, 20w tungsten / camera onboard flash and settings set to tungsten light, I don't think would allow it's UV glow to be captured.



Thanks David, you have given my more to think about.

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

They apparently glow under the UV spectrum...

Dave