---

It is relatively simple to photograph a pinned fly. If the fly has been mounted (pinned) for more than about 1-day this is the only option.
There are several photos of pinned and recently-killed flies on this site. My personal bias is that I find the pin distractive.
For lateral views of fresh flies I actually place the pin horizontally into the thorax. This, of course, slightly damages one side of the thorax. I do not push the pin all the way through the thorax, so that one side of the thorax is not damaged.

An alternative way to get a lateral view without damaging the specimen is to lay the fly on a piece of glass and support this glass about 5 cm from the background. This should result in a shadowless background. After photographing the fly it can be pinned.

This 8mm fly was photographed using a diffused flash; the fly on glass supported 5cm above a grey background.