I think these wonderful creatures that show up in droves every night are Sphinx Moths. They come to my yard every night for one reason - to feed from my Four 'O Clocks. They are hard to video, and harder still to photograph, but I finally got a shot I dared upload. I took several minutes of video footage, and will upload it to Youtube soon.
It's no overstatement to say these critters are difficult to capture on film. I was out at sunset on Saturday making a feeble attempt myself. I shot dozens of frames and still never came out with one I was satisfied with. One of them did bring out a remarkable, metallic gold-orange coloration on the moth's wings, though.
More than keeping up with these speedy critters, I found the biggest challenge was focusing the lens. The only way I could do it was by depending on the auto-focus assist lamp (which still lights even in manual focus) to give me momentary illumination prior to firing the shutter. I guess the ideal technique would be to have some similarly dim but continuous light source that wouldn't disturb the moth or interfer with the stop-action effect of the flash.
Unfortuately, my camera doesn't have a manual focus, so I was already relying on the auto-focus. I had to press the shutter button halfway, then chase the moths around until it looked like one was in focus on the LCD screen. Crude but effective, given what I have to work with. LOL. I took about 40 shots, and three were in focus.
"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it." Thomas Jefferson, 1791
Realy nice shot!
Your patience paid off!