Now that many of the flowers have opened, the feeders have come in larger numbers. This fly (Tachinidae sp.) seems to be vacuuming up the pollen.
Type of Critique Requested
Aesthetic: Feedback on the overall visual appeal of the image, including its color, lighting, cropping, and composition.
Emotional: Feedback on the emotional impact and artistic value of the image.
Technical: Feedback on the technical aspects of the image, such as exposure, color, focus and reproduction of colors and details, post-processing, and print quality.
Specific Feedback and Self-Critique
Too sharp? How about the background?
Technical Details
D500 + 105mm macro 1/125 f22 ISO 800
Cropped in, Denoise, toning in PS, sharpening with Nik Sharpener Pro 3
Great shot, Mike. IMHO, the detail is amazing. Is it too sharp? Not for my old eyes, but would love to hear other peoples thoughts too. The backdrop has a nice soft blur, but I am wondering if darkening it just a tiny bit would help put more emphasis on the fly?? Just a thought.
Mike, this is a great shot. The smaller view looks really good. When I enlarge it to the largest, it does have an appearance that maybe NIK Sharpener may have over done it just a touch. I love the position of the fly, and how you have included some of the same flowers oof in the BG. Looks like you have got some flowers that are attracting the pollinators nicely giving you an opportunity to photograph them.
That is a great shot Mike. It almost seems that the fly posed for you. Not too sharp and the background is good. Darkening the background will bring out the fly more, but that will not be easy because of the wing. Thank said the fly looks great.
Wonderful! What a dynamic composition! I love the soft BG and the sharpness and detail of the fly. You got wonderful DOF for such a small subject. With your APS-C sensor size I would have thought f/22 would give some diffraction softening, but if so you seem to have brought it back with Nik Sharpener. I’ve never had much luck sharpening things. Having such a sharp lens helps.
I wouldn’t darken the BG behind the fly, but would consider a subtle gradient darkening for the bottom 1/3. Not a criticism, just an option to add a little weight to balance the fly. (I doubt if flies weight much…)
I suspect the JPEG conversion has caused the oversharpened look, as it will usually try to sharpen things as it re-sizes. You might experiment with the conversion and see if there is a setting that will minimize it.
This looks great. I like the way the fly is framed, and the pose. Of course the colors are great too, and the stage that the flowers are in adds to it for me.
Although flies aren’t my favorite subject, it’s interesting that this one has an aged bronze hue.
It doesn’t look too sharp to my eyes but, I do need new glasses
I think the BG brightness was handled very well and the exposure on the fly is spot on in my opinion.
Tachinid flies have a lot of character and you were able to capture this one very well. Sharpness is fine and it shows the level of detail you can get with excellent skill. The eye facets are approaching the level of resolution for the image size so we can expect some loss of detail at this level of magnification. Other than those comments, a fine presentation of this very hirsute fly…Jim
