Stranded Jellyfish

[BillTyler]

This "fried egg" jellyfish was one of dozens stranded on the beach at Moss Landing, California.

Nikon D300 with Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 lens
1/320
f/13
200mm
ISO 400
fill flash from built-in flash at -1 stop

Processed in Lightroom 3 to increase saturation.

Bill

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hey Bill,
I think it is a cool habitat story....but photographically this one has a few issues for me. All the highlights and wet areas attract the eye.....so minimizing them by either diffusing the jellyfish in the field......or eliminating them in PP'ing is a good first step. It is a lot of work in post.....se in the casting a shadow on it while in the field would have been my 1st choice......to help tame them . I think then you would have been able to adjust the exposure slightly to get more out of the transluscence of the jelly to show.....as is it gets a bit dark. Finally....you placed the center mouth?.....amost perfectly in the center.....setting it off to one of the power point positions and including the rest would have been preferable. Post processing tweaks will take this up a notch....but not sure enough to overcome n the field issues. Just keep some of these things in mind for next time out in the field.

[Norm Dulak]

Bill:

I agree with Roman that the bright spots are a distraction, and the central cavity should preferably be more compliant with the rule-of-thirds, perhaps by cropping off some from the right. And if the file as created permits it, I would complete the body of the critter on the left side. Also, since the jellyfish was on a beach, I'd have preferred an adjustment in flash power, to reveal some of the surrounding sand. I think that might have set off your subject in a more natural way.

But I commend you for tackling a subject that most people would walk by and ignore. There is beauty even in a stranded jellyfish!:)

Norm