Butterflies of Europe

[Morten]

Not sure if this is the right place to post this or but, so please forgive me if it isn't!

Some of you may have heard of my grandfather, the late Basil Yates-Smith, he took photographs of butterflies. He used a Nikon F2 camera with a Nikon 200mm lens suitably strapped to ensure fixed focus and hence the constant scale of 0.315 x life. To ensure maximum depth of field a Multiblitz professional flash with twin heads was used. These were modified by moving the flash tubes further back in the parabolic reflectors to increase light intensity at the close working distance involved 2feet lens. The photographs taken were then transformed into slides and carefully documented. The slides have been scanned in using a Nikon Super Coolscan 5000 ED slide scanner.

Convinced in the mid 1960’s that butterflies could largely disappear from Western Europe in Basil’s lifetime, he resolved to collect for posterity as many pictures of them as time and resources permitted.

For this purpose the images had to be of high quality, in colour and to a fixed scale, if they were to truly inform about the relative size and appearance of the various species, choice of nectar source and other habitat information also made it imperative that each picture should be completely natural and that nets, dark boxes, fridges, sedatives and other forms of control would by definition be completely ruled out.

Practically every image taken has been retained in the collection regardless of its artistic merit. Thereby fulfilling the aim to collect as many pictures as circumstances permitted. The collection has often been used for slide shows and book illustrations.

Some of his pictures can be found in such books as 'Butterflies of Britain and Europe' ISBN: 0-00-220059-7 and 'Complete British Insects' ISBN: 0-00-717966-9 and many other books. But there has never been a book about butterflies that has solely used his pictures. So I've spent a long time putting together a full colour book called 'Butterflies of Europe', I've dedicated this book to Basil. The link below takes you to the book.

http://www.lulu.com/shop/mark-williams/ ... 29757.html

[bugboy]

Now that sounds like a book that should sit proudly on any lepidopterists bookshelf!

[Morten]

Now that sounds like a book that should sit proudly on any lepidopterists bookshelf!

I must admit I am no lepidopterist, unlike my late grandfather. However I've done my very best to produce something that is accurate as well as having high quality images. It's a very simple book with a butterfly on each page. Each page consisting of two pictures of the butterfly, it's colloquial name, genus and spices. It has an index that lists the butterfly by it's colloquial name and genus.

The only way I have managed to publish this is via self-publishing. However, I've made every attempt to produce a quality publication, which is affordable, easily accessible to people and which people can enjoy!

[NickMorgan]

That sounds like an interesting book and it's great that you have managed to save and share his work.

[Morten]

That sounds like an interesting book and it's great that you have managed to save and share his work.

Thank you, its taken a long time but it was worth it and to see it in print for the first time this week was amazing.

The sole purpose of this book is to share is work!

I hope that people enjoy it.

[David M]

Thank you so much for this information, Morten.

Can you point us towards a page view so we can get a sample of what the book contains?

[Morten]

Thank you so much for this information, Morten.

Can you point us towards a page view so we can get a sample of what the book contains?

Yep the book can be found here: http://www.lulu.com/shop/mark-williams/ ... 29757.html

Under the picture of the cover there is a button saying 'Preview' which will allow you to have a flick though some of the book's first pages.

[David M]

Under the picture of the cover there is a button saying 'Preview' which will allow you to have a flick though some of the book's first pages.

Thanks, Morten. I hadn't spotted that the first time round.

[Morten]

Under the picture of the cover there is a button saying 'Preview' which will allow you to have a flick though some of the book's first pages.

Thanks, Morten. I hadn't spotted that the first time round.

Thought I would upload a picture of the inside of the book, sorry it's not overly clear, but it is better than the preview on the store page.

[David M]

Thanks for that, Morten. It gives me some idea of the layout.

[Morten]

Hello everyone, the final version is at last up for sale. With new improved formatting and tweaked cover design. At the moment it is only for sale though Lulu, however by the end of April it should be available for sale though Amazon as well.

Book Name: Butterflies of Europe

ISBN: 978-0-244-97192-2


http://www.lulu.com/shop/morten-william ... 45310.html