Blue and Black Monarch Butterfly

Image Critiques Macro/Close-up Critiques
1

Description:

Specific Feedback Requested: Any

Pertinent technical details or techniques: No details of record on my PC.

Is this a composite? No

If you would like your image to be eligible for a feature on the NPN Instagram (@NaturePhotoNet), add the tag ‘ig’ and leave your Instagram username below. elwise44

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4 Likes
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Hi,

This is a red spotted purple butterfly. This looks like a heavy crop because there’s little detail from the scales that cover the wings. Heavy noise suppression can remove detail as well. There are some sharpening artifacts as well. I like the BG and the colors are nice and vibrant. The comp is nice as well…Jim

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Wayne, he is beautiful. Never saw one of these before. I agree with Jim that it seems like detail has been lost for whatever reason. I see that you made comment that you didn’t have any technical details of the image anymore, so kind of hard to tell the reason. If you did crop it, you might be able to back out and not crop as tight, and improve it some that way. I love the composition.

4

Thanks guys, this is a heavy crop and I’m sort of trapped in heavy crops for some reason. I like to get in close and personal I guess. Thanks, you remind me to watch how much to crop.
Wayne

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Repost to show the underside of the Red Spotted Purple Butterfly. Thanks Jim, for the ID.
Wayne

1 Like
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This is a VERY gorgeous image in terms of lighting and composition, and I find the orientation and the tight crop very appealing! If you would go back to the raw file you could probably do it justice in terms of better NR – but you say no details. How are you processing – LR and PS have most of the important metadata. Getting close to a subject is always better than cropping but often it isn’t possible. A good lens with enough focal length is the next best.

7

Thanks Diane, I went back and located the RAW photo file. The photo was taken on 8/7/2018 with my canon 5ds-r at f-9, and 1/500sec, "ISO 1600. " Believe it was shot with my 100X400X1.4 mm Extension. Not sure if it was hand held or tripod. I use Photoshop and Lightroom . After zooming in on my RAW file it appears that no scales on the wings are visiable. I try to use my 180 Macro lens now . Thanks for taking your time to review this photo.
Wayne

8

While I agree with the technical comments above, I still find it a striking image, especially the contrastingly-coloured blurred BG and the attractive flowers.

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Thanks Mike, I wonder about the blue color which is light blue and to my faded mind, seems less detailed than some other colors? Just a thought??
Wayne

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This very lovely image is worth a rework of the original raw file! You might pull out a little more detail with some Clarity, and the Highlights slider might bring more detail into the light blues.

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Thanks Diane, worth a try. Have used Topaz denoise and enhancement plus Lightroom “enhance”. Thanks, I’m also going to post the RAW file which will be converted to .jpg of course but it will give you an idea of what I’m working with.
Wayne
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