07/14/12 Featured Arkansas Photography–Butterfly and Thistle in the Boxley Valley

Butterfly and thistle in the Boxley Valley, Buffalo National River

Taken with a Canon 5D MKII, iso 1250, Canon 100-400 zoom lens @ 400mm, F6.3.  Sometimes you find subjects that you don’t expect to find.  On this day, I was working around the Boxley Valley, near Ponca Arkansas along the Buffalo National River.  The day was overcast and I was waiting for the local elk to make their evening appearance.  While leaning up against a fence post, I noticed a lone butterfly that was working some thistles out in the field.  He was about 15 yards away but I was still able to get a good series of shots at 400mm hand held with the aid of Canon’s Image stabilization.  This photograph is crop from the original and is about 1/3 of the full sized file.  The Bokeh of the Canon lens at this focal length was very nice.