Honey Bee collecting pollen

[john stirk]

https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7470/15425325673_e5c3c1622c_c.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/pv5PUV)Bee (https://flic.kr/p/pv5PUV) by bx338 (https://www.flickr.com/people/78466591@N04/), on Flickr

canon 60d
100mm macro lens

[Diane Miller]

Very nice focus and detail on the bee. I might be inclined to burn down (or even crop) the green flower parts on the left, to keep the attention more on the bee.

[john stirk]

Thanks Diane.
I have cropped out the flowers on the left after i posted it on here.
All advice given will be helpful, its quite a learning curve.
Generally im happy with the shot, its bright and crisp, one of my best from that day.

[Steve Maxson]

Hi John and welcome to the Macro forum! The bee is giving you a very nice pose and you captured it with very good sharpness and DOF. This also gives us an excellent view of the pollen sac. Was this natural light or did you use flash? If this were mine, I'd probably clone some of the specular highlights on the bee. This is nicely done and I look forward to seeing more of your work here in Macro!

[john stirk]

Thank you Steve, thats a very encouraging reply.
I took several shots in my garden of Bees and Butterflies that were attracted to the pollen on the Ivy flowers, all hand held without flash, the lighting was good with the sun behind me.
The main problem was getting the shots without casting my shadow over the subject, i guess i got lucky with some of them.