Coralscape with happy homeowner

[Bruce Enns]

Hi, This little filter-feeding hermit crab has found a home in an old Christmas Tree worm tube (about 1/2 to 3/4" in diameter) around which the coral has grown. He looks pretty happy to me! Canon Rebel XT in Ikelite housing, DS125 and DS50 strobes in E-TTL mode, ISO 100, AV mode, 1/200sec, f/18

This one looses something in the transition to an under 200k 1024x683 jpeg...quality setting was 42.

Comments and critiques welcome and thanks for looking!

Cheers!
Bruce

[Alfred Forns]

Hi Bruce

That is one tiny little buy Can't imagine getting in Xmas tree worm tube !!! btw for saving you get as good quality as you want if you save for web, specify the 200k and use bicubic sharper for downsizing !! Let me know if you need any help with it Artie sends out all of the bulletin images at 45k or less for saving space and they are some kind of sharp !!! Hoping to see more fish ... !!!! Love it !!

[Julie Kenward]

Bruce, that is one cool image! I love that little guy peeking out of the coral. I think if you trimmed a little off the right side of the frame and got him a little bit closer to the corner it might be an even stronger comp. As is, I still love it. Great detail and lighting. It really made me smile!

[Bruce Enns]

Thanks Alfred,

The image is super sharp in PS before saving to jpeg...the amount of detail in the photo is amazing but it just doesn't compress very well, because of the algorithm that is used for jpeg compression. Artie's images will compress much better because of clean backgrounds and they usually don't have edge to edge fine detail like the coral in this photo because of his trademark clean backgrounds etc.

This one could probably be improved by starting over from the raw file, but because I was lazy last night I actually downsampled it from an image that I had previously upsampled and super-sharpened for printing (upsampled according to an algorithm recommended by Jeff Schewe). I sure that starting from the raw file will improve the final jpeg a bit, because upsampling and then downsampling can't have helped. It does look great in PS before 'save for web' though...

Cheers!
Bruce

PS more fish in wildlife

[Fabs Forns]

Very nice image, with great composition and happy subject :)

[Gordon Craig]

The composition on this photo is very nice. I believe if this had been shot at F/32 the picture would have been sharper. However I don't know how much the little critter was moving.

[Bruce Enns]

Thank-you Fabs and Gordon! Gordon, other than the foreground, I'm not sure where you are seeing a lack of sharpness. The crab was not moving much but the DOF at this focal distance is pretty small and f/32 may or may not have brought the foreground into sharper focus. Also. as discussed above, this image lost a bit of its punch in the conversion to a jpeg of the appropriate size for posting, but the foreground coral was never sharp.

Thanks again everyone for you comments!

Cheers!
Bruce

[Jay Gould]

Hi Bruce

That is one tiny little buy Can't imagine getting in Xmas tree worm tube !!! btw for saving you get as good quality as you want if you save for web, specify the 200k and use bicubic sharper for downsizing !! Let me know if you need any help with it Artie sends out all of the bulletin images at 45k or less for saving space and they are some kind of sharp !!! Hoping to see more fish ... !!!! Love it !!

I will not say "NO"! Is there a tutorial regarding the "200k - bicubic sharper for downsizing" PS two-step?

BTW, another lovely image Bruce :)

Jay

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

Excellent little crustacean. Congratulations. THese guys are way cool!