Any number of nature or wildlife subjects may be your clue that spring has arrived, but here in the northeastern United States, for me, it is a tiny treefrog appropriately called a spring peeper (Pseudacris crucifer). On the first somewhat balmy night, perhaps with temperatures reaching 10 degrees Celsius/50 degrees Fahrenheit, a lonely-sounding “peep” marks the first tentative serenade of what, in just a few days, may reach an ear-splitting crescendo of courting and breeding spring peepers.
Photographing these little anurans is challenging. The calls of most small treefrogs seem to have a ventriloqual quality, and simply finding a frog can be extremely frustrating. You’ll have better luck if you have a couple of people looking so your friends can point in the direction they think the call is coming from, and via triangulation, you can narrow down your search area. If you are doing this solo, circle the area where you think the call is coming from to get a triangulated point. Peepers, like all frogs and toads intent on breeding, generally call from in or near water. Being treefrogs, peepers may also call while perched on low bushes or cattails, or they may be hiding in the curl of a fallen leaf along the shoreline. If scores, or even hundreds, of frogs are calling, the near-deafening, piercing peeps can be almost overwhelming, and it can be tempting to just give up the search. Don’t!
Some species of frogs and toads also call during the day, but all are most active at night, making finding the subject all the more difficult. Many frogs, as well as spiders, owls, crocodilians, and most mammals, can be found by looking for eyeshine, as the highly reflective tapetum reflects a flashlight’s beam. The trick here is to hold the flashlight close to your eyes; otherwise, the parallax in the reflection won’t reveal the eyeshine. I’m sure you’ve seen rabbits or other nocturnal mammals in your car headlights, and you probably saw the eyeshine first. In fact, as you drove closer, the eyeshine disappeared as your car headlights and your eyes were on two different reflecting planes. That’s parallax. Peepers, unfortunately, don’t reflect eyeshine very well, but you’re likely to notice reflections from the pulsating throat pouch as the frog peeps.
Getting photos will require flash, although if you’re doing video LED lights, like with a Lume Cube, this will work. I always found it frustrating to use a headlamp to light the frog so I could focus when I had a flash mounted on my camera’s hotshoe, as the flash always blocked the headlamp’s light. I’ve solved this problem by using a Lume Cube mounted on a Wimberley F-2 Macro Bracket. This bracket consists of two pieces, an M-1 Quick Release Arm and an M-4 Macro Arm. The M-1 mounts to my macro’s lens foot, but if I’m using a lens without a lens foot, I’ll mount the rig to the camera via an M-8 Perpendicular Plate that connects to an Arca-Swiss style camera plate. The macro bracket works like an articulating arm so the Lume Cube can be positioned as required to illuminate my subject.
Over the years, I’ve used a lot of different flash systems and setups for photographing macro subjects at night with varying results and varying levels of comfort or frustration. I’ve tried two flash systems for key/fill or even, balanced lighting, and I’ve used diffusers and reflectors, always trying for the optimum system. Some flash kits can be quite large and cumbersome, and I’d bet most of you will quickly lose interest, patience, and/or energy if the rig you’re using is heavy and awkward.
I’ve settled on a system that I really like, and that’s using a hotshoe flash with an AK Flash Diffuser. The diffuser looks like a bell-shaped hood that fits over the flash and surrounds the lens, giving soft, diffused light above as well as a degree of fill below via the reflective tray. The diffuser also has a small LED light that you can mount inside to assist in focusing, although I rely on the brighter Lume Cube for this.
Peepers, like virtually all frogs and toads, can be shy, and as you approach, your subject may stop calling. With peepers, that means that their balloon-like throat pouch collapses. Since movement may draw attention, it’s likely that the frog will remain motionless and silent, so be patient. Chances are fairly good that the frog will resume calling after a few minutes.
Lens choice may make the difference in whether or not you’ll have success. Short macro lenses, requiring a fairly close lens-to-subject distance, may have you too close for your subject to resume calling. I’d suggest a macro lens in the 180-200mm range, or a close-focusing telephoto or zoom. If your lens doesn’t focus close, add extension tubes to decrease the minimum focusing distance.
If I can, I use TTL flash, but TTL can be problematic. Reflective surfaces, like water or shiny frog skin, can trick a TTL flash, resulting in an underexposure. By adding flash compensation, you may be able to get the correct exposure, but if it’s not, set your flash on manual mode. At the close working distances involved, you’ll probably have to dial down the flash power (power ratio). Otherwise, at full power, you’re likely to overexpose the subject.
Some version of this vernal spectacle occurs nearly everywhere in the U.S., whether that’s with spring peepers or chorus frogs, American toads or desert-dwelling spadefoots, and the procedure for photographing this interesting event is basically the same for all. Try it! You’ll love it.