Bee inside Magnolia blossom

[Brian Grant]

http://www.photocamel.com/gallery/data/1541/DSC5469a_prt.jpg

[Harshad Barve]

lovely details of bee and inside of flowe , whites are good ,
I liked the postion of bee very much
TFS

[Steve Maxson]

Very good sharpness on the bee and central flower parts, Brian. I think the image would be even stronger if you selectively brightened the bee and those central flower parts - without blowing out the whites directly behind the bee.

[Julie Kenward]

Brian, I need you to post your exif data on this before I can really comment correctly. Here's what I see, though...

You've got a few spots that are so white you've lost any data in them - you might check your histogram and see if there is a spike up the right side - I'm betting there is. That said, you also have quite a bit of noise going on in the darker areas of your image (at the base of the plant and on that front petal on the left side.) You could probably run some noise reduction and bring that down quite a bit.

You also seem to have a bit of a blue cast on the white areas - open up levels and click on the white eye dropper and then touch that to the really white space between the petals (in the BG area) and watch how the blues disappear.

That said, you did an excellent job of catching the bee in flight. If it were my image, I'd tone down the specular and/or flash highlights on the body of the bee so it looks more natural and maybe lighten up on the sharpening a bit. I'd also take a bit off the bottom and top of the image.

[Brian Grant]

Actually, I leave the exif in all of my images. If you have Opanda or other exif reader, you should be able to pull it all up.

1/3200 at f8 Nikon D300 with 105mm VR handheld. No Flash, just direct florida sunlight which can be pretty harsh.

[Julie Kenward]

Yes, but you need to post your specs with every image (that's the rules of the forums here at BPN) so everyone can instantly see what equipment and settings you used to create the image and then how you handled post production. It helps us all learn the thinking process that went into the image and helps us as moderators to be able to correctly comment on your image.

Thank you for understanding!

[Anita Bower]

I like the composition and the sharpness of the stamens. I admire those of you who are patieint enough to capture a flying insect in a photo. Suggested improvements have been made by others.

[Mike Moats]

Hey Brian, I really like this image. Jules makes some good points, and I would suggest a crop off the right side, I don't think you need that much of the petal showing.