Frog Eyes

[Christopher Miller]

On our property there are two vernal ponds where the wood frogs and spring peepers come to breed. I took this lying on the ground with my camera just above the water.

The light was a little harsher than I would like as it was middle of the afternoon, but that's the only time of day when the sun is shining on the pond since it's in the woods. I also felt that the BG was a bit too busy, so I blurred it some in PS. Any C&C are welcome!

Olympus SP-550 UZ
f4.5 @ 1/400, ISO 100, -1 EV
Aperture priority mode, pattern metering, auto WB
Processed in PS CS2; cropped, curves adjustment, saturation increase, noise reduction on BG, and blurred BG a bit

[Steve Canuel]

Very cool shot. Sharp and colorful. I like the just slightly off center comp. BG looks good. Uncluttered where it needs to be, right on the eye and reflection. Nice job.

[Lana Hays]

Christopher
I do love that "eye level" look.....certainly an eye to eye view. Excellent PS work on the BG....looks very nice. The light may have been harsh but it doesn't look that harsh in the image. Well done.

[Christopher Miller]

Thanks Steve and Lana for your comments. I appreciate them!

[D. Robert Franz]

Love the low angle you achieved.. Light doesn't look to bad at all. BG looks fine. I wasn't crazy about the comp a bit to centered for my taste. I took the liberty of cropping to place the very strong compsotionally eye in the upper right power point. What do you think?

[Christopher Miller]

Thanks Robert for the alternate crop. Personally I like both my crop and yours though I think I would prefer having the frog closer to the lower right power point rather than the upper right. Thanks for commenting!

[D. Robert Franz]

Thanks Robert for the alternate crop. Personally I like both my crop and yours though I think I would prefer having the frog closer to the lower right power point rather than the upper right. Thanks for commenting!

The reasons I chose the upper right PP is that it eliminates some of the BG which is slightly busy and it also puts your eye reflection on the lower left PP for an even stronger comp.....