Long Legged Fly ( Austrosciapus connexus)

[Ray Walker]

This is another pic taken at night( while they sleep on a leaf) with a torch, as they are so quick during the day a pic would be nearly impossible.
450D, 105 macro, ex tubes, diffused flash set on manual ( half power), LED torch for light, manual mode, f/10, s/s1/200.iso 400.
All critique welcome...

[shane shacaluga]

Hi Ray,

Nice focus on the eye and good work in catching one of these on a leaf

On many occasions the strong light bouncing off the leaf or the colour of the torch used can affect the colours

I hope you dont mind that I have tried to tame the greens and yellows a bit to bring out a more natural look

I also brightened the shadow in the bottom part of the eye a bit

Hope you like it

[Ray Walker]

Thanks Shane. No way do I mind , its great that you have taken the time to help. My P/S skills are very limited.
Thanks again.

Cheers Ray.

[Diane Miller]

Well capture, with very pleasing framing of the subject. Shane tamed the yellows nicely. They can get out of hand easily. An option is to lower the white balance a bit in the raw conversion.

[Ray Walker]

Thanks Diane..I only shoot in jpeg as my computer ( ubuntu) can't handle raw..

[Gerhard Weldhagen]

Nice work Ray. Nice depth of field and details on the subject. The original picture is closer to the real colours of this fly.

[Steve Maxson]

A beautiful fly! I like what Shane did in his repost - but if they really are that brightly colored as Gerhard notes, then the best of both worlds might be to have your original colorful fly set against Shane's background. Of course, getting there could be the issue - it would help to be working with RAW files and you might need some semi-advanced Photoshop skills or a familiarity with something like NIK's Photoshop plugin software.