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Terry Waggoner's picture

Moth Feathers

An extreme macro shot of the back of a moth.............

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14 Comments

cool

THAT'S a macro shot?!? I would have assumed you used a microscope. Neat.

It's was done at 17x.............micro starts at 20x, at least in my circles..........thanks for the comment.

AWESOME! Great abstract view of a something that you would never associate with the image. I love the little bit of iridescence visible on some of the scales.

Nice work Terry!

PS - This group will only thrive if everyone participates. I would encourage you to join in the conversation. Critiquing develops our eyes to then critique our own work better and it helps everyone grow. My motto is "the rising tide raises all boats". I encourage everyone to join in helping us all improve. Or - sometimes a "great job" is enough!

That being said..........I'm one of those odd people who would rather receive critical comments concerning my images as I learn a great deal more from them...........so what would you change or do different?

I always hate to jump in to much for new people. I do appreciate your desire to learn though. Here are some thoughts:

When you removed the background, there is a halo left behind on the top edge of the moth and an odd blurring at the bottom edge. You might try darkening these two areas to get rid of both. Plus, the darkened background might really make the more pop up from the background. (see example 1 below)

Then - keeping in mind that I am an abstract photographer at heart, I would try and pull out a section of only scales and juice it up a little. There are amazing colors in here! And, a nice strong diagonal that would inhance the composition aspect of this. (#2 - the screen capture could only go so small!).

I hope this is OK! I this you are off on an amazing thing with the crazy level of macro you have here!

Thank you very much for comments........this is not a complaint but an FYI..........the haloing is caused by focusing stacking.........if my memory hasn't completely collapsed, it involved 43 images. When shooting at this magnification the DOF is about 80um(there's 1000um's in a millimeter) and when stacking causing haloing as the plain of focus shifts ever so slightly. The suggestions were noted and appreciated. Thank you.

Ok, now that’s interesting.

Question?

I have a question Terry - when working with such an extremely limited DOF how on earth do you adjust your focus so minutely each time to gain a suitable stack?
This, for me, makes the mag that more incredible.

I found trying to use a focusing rail imprecise so I bought a Cognisys Stackshot. Expensive yes, but it allows me to able to achieve movement as little as 2 um which makes focus stacking accurate.

https://www.cognisys-inc.com/store/stackshot-macro-rail-package.html

Thanks Terry, that's a pretty impressive piece of gear!

Remarkable image Terry. Nature sure has wonders way beyond what can be seen by the bare eye.

Well done!