The system was used in conjunction with a virtual reality flight arena with video input delivered to the floor and two walls.
The combination of forward and downward velocities within the fly-centred coordinate system leads to horizontal movement of the head in the flight arena, if it takes a non-zero negative pitch angle.
"We are changing the whole philosophy of how the arena system works," says Ossenmacher.
Working with five Indian peacocks (pictured above), the scientists set up a flight arena where they could film the birds taking off with high-speed 3D video cameras.
I recorded the echolocation calls and foraging success of 14 juvenile little brown bats, Myotis lucifugus, as they foraged repeatedly in a large flight arena in two habitat treatments: open space and cluttered space.
No imaged bees were returned to the flight arena.
We recorded 97 flights in a flight arena with an obstacle.
Other bees were collected for imaging directly from the feeder or flight arena with forceps.
The remaining cercus of the preparation was aligned with the long side of the flight arena.
In fact, the apparent volume of our flight arena was eight times larger still, taking reflections of the physical arena into account.
