I'm In Heaven

[Tomislav Kljucaric]

http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/7861/inheaven.jpg


Hello everybody,

one of my first and favorite images because it looks to me as this dragonfly is on a white cloud.

Nikon D40x, Nikkor 60 mm 2.8
F/7,1.
Shutter speed, 1/320s.
Aperture priority
ISO:100
Hand held

[Christopher Miller]

I can see why it's one of your favorites, Tomislav! Great colors, and it really does like he's on a cloud. Very interesting composition, though I'm not sure I like how the damselfly is cut off by the frame. Would like to at least see all of his feet and possibly more of his body.

[Dave Leroy]

Yes, it certainly does look a bit like a nice soft cloud. I like how sharp the fly is. I think Chris has a good point about seeing more of the damselfly. Well done on the colours. Dave

[Julie Kenward]

Tomislav, I like the overall feeling to this image and see why it IS one of your favorites. You're really doing well with getting good, crisp details on your insects and that's a big step in the right direction!

Two things I think are possible setbacks on this image and that is 1) the cut off feet and body of the insect and 2) how white your white flowers are. I agree with the others that, at the very least, all the feet should be present in the image and, really, the entire body should be included. The reason I'm saying this is because if you went to sell this image I highly doubt anyone would want the front third of a dragonfly - they'd most certainly want the whole beautiful insect! I would have backed off a bit and tried to get his entire body in the image as he is, afterall, the focal point.

As for the flowers, some of the OOF petals are pretty darn white and some of the details appear to be missing - this is a sure sign that you are a bit overexposed. Check the histogram and see if you don't see a spike on the far right side. If you processed this in RAW format, you might still be able to pull those whites back a bit with the recovery slider but if you went with JPEG then that data is lost.

If you have any questions about anything I've mentioned feel free to ask away either here or in a PM. You're doing incredible work - just keep at it and you'll develop that 'sixth sense' that photographers have about composing a photograph for maximum impact.