"The osprey image was a personal obsession of mine," Linstead says. "I had the rare opportunity to spend four days in a tiny hide at the edge of a pond in Finland. This location near Tampere is arguably the best spot on earth to photograph this behavior." The chance for the image didn't happen right away. "Twelve hours per day in the blind produced this image on the second day," he says.
In a move you'd see at a Cirque du Soleil show, this female regal jumping spider moves with ease, as captured by Linstead.
"The left-to-right jumps are considerably easier to photograph than the head-on ones," he says. "Unfortunately this perspective lacks the eye contact that gives this species its charm."
A secondary benefit from using backlighting on the shot, he says, is that it highlights the spider's web.
This was another studio image "birthed out of the desire to have full control over the habitat and lighting for an insect flight shot," Linstead says. "The image was produced on my kitchen table." A custom-made Plexiglass device "was used to guide the bee's flight path. I also oriented the set so that the flight path pointed directly at my open patio door so that the bee could fly right to freedom after tripping the camera."
Linstead "had a brief opportuntiy to photograph this disagreeable creature (a marsupial) in captivity after business hours at a local pet store. I chose a black background as I thought I could get away with it given the nocturnal habits of this marsupial. The 'take off' perch to the right of the image was a cat's scratching post, and the glider is en route to his cage on the bottom left."