Dean Reeves II

Tontitown, Arkansas, United States

I'm a traditional artist, but have been focusing more and more on photography for about 5 or 6 years now. I've been involved with art of one form or another my entire life.

I prefer to shoot humans, and I love doing photoshop retouching, but when I don't have a model handy I always have a yard full of bugs to keep me busy!

I shoot with a 8mp Canon Rebel XT that is screaming to be replaced. The only macro lens I own is a 60's model Sears 55mm macro that I bought at a flea market. It came with an extention tube that makes it a full 1:1. The biggest challenge is that focus is manipulating the aperture manually while at the same time focusing by leaning in/out toward the subject. Not a technique that nets many pin-sharp images, but it sure has trained me to hold my camera steady. XD

I prefer shooting Dragonflies of all the insects, but due to the range of my lens I have far too few in my portfolio. They are so skittish.

Most of my photos from this year (2011) have been of spiders. We seem to have an over-abundance this year.

I've always had a bit of a fear of insects. I liked spiders growing up because they ate all the other bugs. Doing macro insect photography has really helped me get over a lot of my fear of bugs.