Mating insects

[Ravi Hirekatur]

Here is my next macro post. I think these are beetles, but I couldn't find them in Audubon's field guide for insects. Can anyone tell me the ID of these insects? Taken at Ninesprings E-Way park in Madison, WI. I think the composition is a little tight as I had to avoid a few distracting elements in the frame. Exposed to the right in the histogram to get details on the dark parts of the insects.
Camera - Canon 7D
Canon 100mm/f2.8 macro
f8, 1/20, ISO 200
No cropping. Color and contrast corrections in CS4. A few bright reflective spots cloned out on the body of the upper insect.
The bright area on right lower frame painted with brush tool to darken (I learned to use the brush tool!)
sharpened on dSLR fractal sharpen

C&C appreciated

[Brendan Dozier]

Very nicely composed behavior image, Ravi. Cool looking bugs, interesting markings and like the rich red & blue coloring. Nice diagonal line and good detail, but maybe needs just a tad more sharpening on insects. I might also consider toning down the yellow area on the rt or cropping some off on that side for a more narrow vertical pano.

[Dave Leroy]

Nicely done. I like that insects are square to the sensor. Good suggestions by Brendan. It also seems just a tad tight on the bottom. I would like to suggest that using 400ISO or even 800 would have provided a bit more ss. It seems there is never enough ss to get those really fine details to pop out.

Looking forward to more.

[Julie Kenward]

I also would blend out most of that brighter yellow circled area so it looks more like the rest of the BG. I think raising your ISO to 400 with a 7D is an excellent idea - don't be afraid to do that; it should handle it just fine. I'm also finding that the bodies of the insects are rather blue, as is the tone of the greens in the BG; I adjusted the WB more to the yellow side and darkened the bluer areas of the body a bit to make them appear more black. I also cloned and/or darkened the antenna to give them more sharpness and presence but that's certainly not something that would have to be done. Here's what I came up with...use the ideas if you like them.

[Ravi Hirekatur]

Thanks Brendan, Dave and Julie. I love the repost. Julie, I remember that the insect didn't have a bluish body, so the WB correction has really brought out the colors. I will work on the image and try to repost. Great tips from all of you. I have a lot to learn.
Ravi

[Ravi Hirekatur]

Julie,
I am trying to duplicate what you have done on the image. It is not getting any close. I am able to change the white balance, but I am not getting the same effect when I tried to darken the bodies of the insects. How did you darken them?
Thanks
Ravi

[Julie Kenward]

Ravi, I used a software program called Nik Viveza that lets you easily select certain colors/tones and lighten/darken them...however, you can do it with a curves adjustment in Photoshop, too!

1. Open your image in Photoshop and then open a curves adjustment layer.

2. In the upper left hand corner of the curves box you'll see a hand inside a box with a little up/down arrow next to it. Click on that and you'll see the box turn white; this activates the tool.

3. Now go over to your image to where the body is too light in color and click on that. You'll see a small black dot appear over on the main curves box and that dot represents the tonal range that you just clicked on. Since you want to make that tone darker, you'll grab that dot and pull down just a bit and you'll see that tone instantly get darker on your photograph while the other tones stay pretty close to the same.

4. Now look below the curves box to where it says "input" and "output". When you clicked on the black area of the photograph the "input" number went from 255 to around 64. Pull that black dot down until the input # is around 52 or so...that should get you right about where you want the final blacks of the bodies to be.

Let me know if you have any other questions!

[Ravi Hirekatur]

Here is the repost - I changed the WB towards yellow. darkened the body using curves. used brush tool to even out the background and clear out the white spot. Further sharpened the image in dSLR sharpen.It still looks flat compared to Julie's repost. I learned a couple of new things with this. Thanks everyone for all the suggestions.

[Julie Kenward]

I think you did a great job, Ravi! It's always fun when you learn something new!

[Steve Maxson]

Hi Ravi. You have lots of excellent suggestions above (which I won't repeat) and you have put them to good use in your repost which has given you better colors and a clean background. :S3: Regarding the ID - These are not beetles. Rather, they appear to be in the order Hemiptera (true bugs). From this viewing angle we can't see the color patterns on the back of these insects, but they might be Large Milkweed Bugs (Oncopeltus fasciatus) (Family Lygaeidae). Keep them coming!

[Ken Childs]

Hi Ravi, I'm late in replying and it appears that this one has been covered well but I wanted to say that I liked the original and your repost takes this one way up! Nicely done! :S3:

[Ravi Hirekatur]

Thanks Steve and Ken,
this was a big learning curve for me. I am putting what I learned here to improve other pictures.
I sent this picture to an entomologist. he identified these as Box elder bugs.