Very nice shot - the bee is nicely focused and framed.
I think the picture could be much better with some work with levels and highlights/shadows in photoshop. The picture looks too light and the petals are missing details.
The following I used level slider, curves and highlights/shadows and I think it improves but I leave it for you to decide.
I will remove if you like
It is a great picture and well worth improving in photoshop
The picture does seem a tad more....vibrant, for lack of a better word with the levels adjustment. It helped having a great shot to start with. How long did you have to wait for the bee to fly into the scene? I was out shooting the other day and was actually trying to take a shot when a bee flew in and interfered. Realizing the opportunity, I snapped off my shutter a few times, but my already shallow dof was trained on the tip of the stamen, and the bee was just way oof! In any case, nicely done, and as Scott said, with a few tweaks,. a great shot!
Thanks, guys. You were both very helpful in your suggestions.
Scott, I went back to CS2 and instead of tweaking it in higlights/shadow, I dodged and burned it here and there to give the petals a more realistic look.
Jason, I don't know with the Canon, but with the Nikon D-200, here are my custom settings for moving subjects to nail the focus:
AF-C Continuous Servo AF
CH Continuous High Motor Drive
AF mode Group Dynamic Autofocus
a3 Custom setting set to patttern 1 Center Area
a5 Custom Setting set to "ON" (enabled Lock-On)
a1 Custom Setting set to Focus Priority (forces ONLY in-focus shots)
With these custom settings, I get more keepers.
Whatever you did has given the petals a multi-coloured look that I doubt is more realistic. Pink and green is not what I'd expect to see but I could be wrong. I haven't transferred it into a colour-managed program but neither of the other two images have the green tinge where previously there were white highlights.
I'd crop this image into a portrait mode. The right third does nothing but show a bright and blurry stick and could be cut off to let us concentrate on the bee and the flower.
Alan321 wrote:
Whatever you did has given the petals a multi-coloured look that I doubt is more realistic. Pink and green is not what I'd expect to see but I could be wrong. I haven't transferred it into a colour-managed program but neither of the other two images have the green tinge where previously there were white highlights.
I'd crop this image into a portrait mode. The right third does nothing but show a bright and blurry stick and could be cut off to let us concentrate on the bee and the flower.
Thanks, Alan. i will take note of that. Thank you all for looking and for all the comments. It has been most helpful to me.
Personally I like number 1 the most, but it looks slightly overexposed with the highlights on the petals blown. You could try contrast masking to even the exposure (technique outlined on luminous landscape)
To my eye neither of the new versions are improvements - the first has lots of nasty posterisation, and the second looks, as noted above, a little unnatural.
