Eastern Lilysquatter

[Dave Johnson]

Shot this morning at a local pond in dull overcast light. This species is quite widespread. It's range covers Vietnam, China, South Korea and Japan and is tiny at only 30 ~ 39 mm in length! Despite being brightly coloured, they're as thin as a pin and pretty difficult to spot when perched.

Shooting info: Canon 60D, tripod, 100mm F2.8 L macro lens, SS 1/50sec, ISO 640, F 11. Cropped, sharpened, plus other minimal PP work.

C&C welcomed. Thanks for looking.

[Jonathan Ashton]

Dave you have captured the insect very well, by not going in too close you have got good DOF and fine focus head to tail, at this distance you could have easily got away with f8. Composition I would suggest a little cropping - here personal taste plays a part but the damsel is smack bang in the centre and this does not maximise it's presence if you see what I mean. I sense there is a green cast -probably reflected light - look at the thorax and how the colour changes throughout the length of the body. You have an ideal background - a couple of tweaks and you have a super image.

[Marina Scarr]

Stunning image with gorgeous colors. Loving the design of the leaves. Wouldn't have known about the color cast but brought it into PS and a color balance adjustment really made a difference. If this were mine, I would crop it on the right at the first leave (which not only takes your subject out of center but also alleviates the BG which isn't as pleasing) and crop just a tad from the top. It really brings an already great image up another notch!!!

[Dave Leroy]

Lovely image of the little fly. I really like the broadside look revealing lots of detail.
Interesting comment about the color cast. I would not have caught that but certainly makes sense with the reflected light. Also interesting about crops often being personal preference. I had thought of a more pano look taking off the bottom leaf.

[LindaHarden]

The overcast lighting seems to make the little damsel glow... I agree about cropping a little more to remove some distracting elements and improve the composition. This is a nice image and I enjoyed looking at it.

[Dave Johnson]

Thanks again folks for a detailed and precise analysis of this shot. F8 would've definitely helped to blow the background out some more... Composition and cropping was a nightmare. I tried to go for a pano style but the image quality faded rapidly the closer in I went and decided to leave it as is. I'll try again though.
Jonathan right on with the green cast, and well spotted. The true colour should be the opal blue of the tail along the whole body length.

Here's a re-post addressing the crop. Couldn't address the colour cast problem though as there's nothing to correct it in DPP.

Attachment 117816

[Dave Leroy]

I much prefer this crop and IQ looks fine to me. Lovely.

[Jonathan Ashton]

Dave you can correct colour casts in DPP using curves (the RGB tab).

[LindaHarden]

I agree... the new crop makes the damselfly really stand out.

[Dave Johnson]

Dave you can correct colour casts in DPP using curves (the RGB tab).

Thanks, I tried to figure it but failed miserably. Should I be using the little dropper or alter the curves in the blue or green channel?

RE the crop, I too feel this focuses more attention on the subject. Thanks for the suggestions and comments.