I’m finding I just don’t care much right now about politics, or partisanship, or Iraq, or a presidential election still too far away to pay attention to…
The lure of spring, in combination with the marvelous toy Polimom received for Christmas from DH, have me distracted altogether.
So — instead of yammering on some more about things I’m really not following very carefully, I thought I’d show you what I’ve been doing with myself.
EEK! BEES!
Just kidding… Really, you are getting pretty good with that new toy. I love the detail on the wing in #4, but I also like the overall composition in #2 and #7. While #5 is OK, if you could have somehow stopped the wings (or at least slowed them down enough so that we could see wings) that would have been awesome. On #6, it appears that the stamens/pistils of the flowers are more in focus than the bee is, which makes for an interesting scene (but not one I would have done.)
Don’t know which one I like best — but then if I had come across a bee, I wouldn’t be getting near so up close and personal.
Too bee, or not too bee…
Happy Easter,
~EdT.
Hint: take Bee #7, crop in a rough circle centered on the bee and including the yellow area of the flower, and submit it to Steph Davis over at Shutterblog,
~EdT.
Ed T – Thanks so much for the feedback!!! It feels like I’m getting better (and that I had a real breakthrough a day or two ago) — but I really have hit the point now where I need other eyes and critique-ing.
Bee 6, btw, is my personal favorite. As you said, the stamen / pistils are in better focus, but it’s because the bee shifted slightly when the shot fired. Shutter was at 1/640 sec, so he didn’t go far, and he ended up looking transluscent — except for the wings. I sharpened a tad to get the veins in them, btw.
I put a couple other shots over on the betterphoto gallery, also. (link) Two of them are macros of a Passion Vine blossom. They are (imho) the most alien of the flowers in my garden. That gallery, btw, has a comments function; hopefully, you’ll tell me if you see something I could improve (since nobody has said word one to me over there…)
Not sure what you mean, though, by “submit” to Stephanie. You mean in a comment with a link to the (cropped) photo?
Thanks again, Ed! Happy Easter to you, too. Stay warm!
Yes. Simply post a comment on her blog entry titled ADIP (A Day in Pictures) with a link back to the image. The comment system there doesn’t take user-written HTML I don’t think, so you can just paste the URL in.
I thought you had sharpened #6 a bit. The wings were OK, but I think you may have overdone it a bit on the stamens and pistils. You might try it again on another copy of the original image (you don’t tweak original images, do you?) and try selective sharpening using a duplicate layer. Sharpen the top (duplicate) layer, set opacity to 100%, then “erase” the top layer to get the “selectively sharpened” effect.
~EdT.
Hunh. Haven’t started trying to fool around with layers yet. I’ll try it, thanks!
Just curious, are these crops of full size images (no resize)? Are you using the “standard” kit lens?
I know what you mean about those passion flowers. I took
this photo without realizing what kind of flower it was.
Hi Glenn,
The thumbnails here are resized, but the links are to crops from the originals. And yes, I’m using the standard issue lens — Nikkor 28-80mm. It’s not great for macros, or for telephotos either, for that matter. But I promised myself I’d master (as much as possible) the standard lens before sinking the mega $$ into more lenses.
And what the heck is that flower you linked to? Is that a passion vine, also? Wild! It doesn’t look like mine at all!
The flower is of the same family, also a passion vine flower, but taken in Argentina; at Iguazu falls.
Ah, I forgot to mention my favorite – I like Bee2, for the contrast between the bee, the blue on the right, and the green on the left.
Glenn —
I’m so glad you commented about your photo. Not only was it a beautiful shot, but I’d never heard of Iguazu Falls before — which means that your response sent me off on a brief online self-education. Thanks so much!