Hi Everybody
Yesterday before it began to rain, I found this little bright red guy. It was really cooperative. I really like this bright red color. It is amazing what vibrant colors nature can produce.
I used a small Octabox Diffuser on the flash. Please don't hesitate to comment. Your opinion is much appreciated! ;)
Looking good. I love how the pollen is powdered on its body. Are these beetles pollinators? I found out not too long ago flies are which surprised me.
I really don't have a critique on these as it looks good to me and seems like you accomplished what you set out to do.
I can understand with the rain as well. I had gotten my new extension tubes and all it did was rain since. I managed to get my yard cut today and what do I see? A carpenter bee. I wanted to run back inside and grab my camera, but I had to finish before, you guess it, it rained again.
Thank you for the comment. According to Wikipedia they actually feed on pollen.
"Adults feed on aphids, and also eat pollen and nectar."
This one was crawling across those tiny daisies (around 1/2-3/4 Inch, 1.5cm). I was lucky, then I think the starting rain slowed the beetle down. If you look closely on the first picture, you can see a droplet on its back.
Your bee would be great to take a picture of. Sometimes you need luck. But I think you will see one again. I wish you luck!
Well how about that, there is a raindrop on its back. That is awesome. Good job.
Yeah, that bee will be back, they have made a hole in my deck I've yet to patch. It was just being adorable when I stopped to look at it. Kinda following me like a jumping spider does.
About to post an updating picture of the spider in my discussion.
You will get one of those bees!
The droplet I did not see when I shot the image. I discovered it, when I was culling my pictures. In the picture bellow, I saw it the first time. But I missed the focus completely on the bug (only the antennae are in focus). So I decided not to take the pic... ;)
I have a photo of one of them in my profile. Not as good as I'd like it to bee < pun intended. LoL
But yeah, I'm sure I'll find it again as they seem to love to eat yellawood and my deck is built out of yellawood.
That would have been great to have that picture in better focus. The pollen on its nose is a adorable. Its looking up like a kid that just devoured a bunch of candy.
What perfect pictures. Great work
Thank you very much!
Great pics! You really got a lot of depth of field. What aperture were you using?
My only suggestion would be to go in and sharpen up the eye just a little bit. Don't go to crazy with it, just a little and just the eye.
Thank you very much! Those were my settings.
Picture 1: 1/80s, f/10, ISO 1600, Flash 1/128
Picture 2&3: 1/60s, f/8, ISO 1000, Flash 1/128
In Pic 1 I was close, the others I was further away, which gave more depth of field. Then I cropped. I added the uncropped pics here. Thank you for the suggestion. I tried it in pics bellow.
Apparently I need to check my flash settings in my camera as well, your comment on your flash setting made me realize that. I was confused by the settings it has for the flash and the only external flash I have is a macro ring that I don't have a ring to attach to my macro lens.
My lens is fully manual so when I look at the EXIF data it always says my f stop is 0.00. I generally try to keep it around f16 and smaller, may try wider based on your settings.
Check out some basic flash videos. It has not to be a Macro related one.
I short. If you use a small aperture like f/16 you block out all the light. The flash is your only light source. That is the reason for the black background in your pictures. That is no failure, I like low-key and it's a nice style! To get more light in, you only have two options left: Shutter speed ad ISO.
In my case it was already really dark and I'd like to have not a black background. So I lowered my shutter speed and raised the ISO. Usually a moving object will be blurry on 1/60s, but here comes the flash in play. If you have a short burning time, it will freezes your subject. ;)
It does not matter, if you have a manual only lens. The metering system of the camera doesn't need the f-stop number. I'm using a Nisin i60a on camera flash. You can also use a pop-up flash. It's only important, that you diffuse the light.
Hope it helps! ;)
It truly does, thank you. I'm thinking about just breaking down and getting me a speed light as the recharge on the internal flash is quite annoying especially when you are working with a moving subjects.
I'm about to go out right now and see how this new setting reacts. I was out not too long ago and while I did get some "decent" pictures, they weren't really that good. Here are a couple examples:
(If you don't want me posting pics in your discussion just ask, I just realized that may be kinda rude, my apologies if so)
It's no problem for me! Wish you good luck!
Great set of images Gion-Andri! I have no feedback on your technique. These look well taken, exposure, DOF, etc all look great.
So my friends call me Ms Picky when it comes to composition. I am too. ;) Mostly because cropping is one of the most important composition skills you can learn to take an image from good to great. We all spend a lot of time in post processing and then 'crop and go'.
There are two composition concepts I would suggest thinking about here. The first is that arranging your subject in the center of the image can give a 'text book' feeling. "This is a ______." It is a natural tendency of our visual processing to look at something centered as the important item and not look around the rest of the image as a whole. Offsetting from center forces your eye to move around the image and create a more complex, pleasing visual experience. I'm glad you put in the full image below as i can use that as an example. Cropping your guy to the side does the above and balances negative space with the rest of the image.
The second suggestion is to try and have your subject always look into the image. If you put a dot in the center-ish of the image, the subject often works better from a composition perspective if it is facing the dot rather than looking away from it. Looking away draws the viewers eye to follow which leads out of the image rather than in to it. This is directed at my favorite image (below) which if it was on the left side so the beetle looked into the image would be a home run.
These are just suggestions. like all rules, they work sometimes and not others. I wouldnt bother with except that i think you did a solid job with these and just a little tweaking could take you up a level.
Great work!
PS - i hope this doesn't come across overly lecturey. I just get frustrated in my posts when i get feedback like "try shifting the crop over" and i have no idea what they were trying to show me. :)
Thank you Ruth for your compliments and the suggestions. I always appreciate good feedback. ;)
On square crops I'm tending to put the subject in the center. I really don't know why. I agree with you, that the subject should view (lead) into the image.
Usually I try to get my composition right in the camera. But I figured out quickly, that this is not working in Macro Photography for me. The main cause are the moving subjects and my new nemesis: Wind :)
Thank you very much for the feedback.