Papilio Demolion - Banded Swallowtail

Like most paps, not easy to get close enough for a clean shot.

BUT, when you do, what a nightmare. The lateral wing strip is a very pale green, but when you get back to the lab, the stripe is inevitably white. This is because the butterfly is predominantly black, which means that the camera metering system tries to make the black into a grey and lengthens the exposure, which in turn, washes the subtle green strip out to white.

On the next opportunity, you remember this, and adjust the exposure compensation to one stop under. Of course, this gives a problem with the black, but I believe the stripe feature is what counts in this case. I could probably do something clever with Photoshop by masking the stripe and lightening the rest - pfft!

Location is Bandung, West Java, Indonesia. Alongside a stream and paddy fields.