I found the glare in the center overpowering the dice and tugging my eye down away from them and out the bottom. I played with it a bit and came up with this....
Hummm.... Interesting. Haven't made up my mind quite whether the reflection draws the eye up from the bottom onto the dice or away downward. If away downward, indeed capping such a flow would be good and mimicking the reflected inverse of the V shape in the introduced shadow cap would be the way to go.
Small apertures (physical size) and small f/stops (f/number) are opposites. f/stop being the ratio of the physical diameter of the aperture and the focal length. An f/1.0 50mm lens has aperture that is 50mm in diameter. An f/2 lens has an aperture wide open of 25mm, at least in theory. Modern lens designs may deviate with smaller physical apertures (e.g.. a 50mm f/2 with an aperture of 30mm) but the lens is marked as f/2 by comparison with a reference standard.
If you compare resolution for any lens over its aperture range you seen that from wide open the resolving power increases for about 2-1/2 to 3 stops, the starts decreasing again due to diffraction as the physical size gets smaller. So an f/1.4 lens is sharpest at f/2.8 to f/4 and a f/2.8 lens around f5.6 to f/8.
As the aperture gets smaller it also changes the X optical path. That doesn't affect film, but digital sensors sites are U shaped wells and the way the light rays at the edges of the frame hit them at a more acute angle affects IQ.
So there is actually sound measurebational basis for the rule of thumb with digital to not increase f/stop (reduce aperture) above f/11 but in practice in most photos the difference in IQ between the resolution sweet spot and f/22 might not be noticed or attributed to other variables such as DOF, focus etc. It's difficult to see perceptually on other than flat 2D targets because of the fact the DOF changes: perceptually a shot at f/22 seems sharper than one at f/5.6 on the 3D subject because more of it is seen in sharp focus.
Optimal results would be obtained by shooting at the f/stop with best resolution, shifting focus in multiple shots and then blending them in PP.
The longer the lens focal length the higher the largest f/stop number will be. Working at National Geographic I operated a process camera as big as my garage with a 40"x48" film back and a 42" lens that stopped down to f/256. Because f/stop = aperture diameter/ focal length that as still a relatively large opening (0.164") not exactly a pin hole.
When making the largest size wall maps we turned the camera in an enlarger and projected a smaller halftone dot positive version of the map on to 4' x 6' lithographic film on the copy board in the darkened gallery with a carbon arc lamp as as source. The map was 6/C so we enlarged 6 different plates. The film was too big for our 42" processor and wouldn't fit flat in even our darkroom's largest sinks, so we put rolled and unrolled it as we developed it.
Relatively speaking digital is far simpler, and I have an appreciation for Kaden's experimentation and the smell of developer and hypo stained clothing. Being that it was National Geographic we were required to wear ties under the lab coats, and few of mine survived my time there
40"x48" film back - Wow! That is a monstrous camera by anyone's standard. Mega plates
relatively speaking amongst LF aficionados is anything above 11x14 and in general not
above 20x30. I can imagine a tripod/holder for such a monstrous camera as stated.
Personally, I am not really into massive sizes. That kind of art loses much of the intimacy
with the viewer that I like so much. In fact, amidst my last purchases was a 1892 Perken,
Son & Rayment, Optimus Long Focus 8½ x 6½ inches camera, just perfect for traditional
large format plates, which I intend to use mainly for collodion and daguerreotype making.
