took this image a few days ago,cant' seem to find out what they are,cannon7d,100mm f/2.8,IS,L,USM,cannon.f/9.1/500s,iso800,tripod,stood in shallow pond,crop,slight sharpen.thanks,comments good or bad.
Super shot I agree the head is just ever so slightly soft. Not sure of the species - some kind of beetle but doesn't narrow it down a whole lot I am afraid!
I'm clueless on the species as well so we'll have to let the bug guys have a go at that. I do like the angle and the fact that so much of both beetles are in focus. The only thing that bugs me a little is that one front leg that's less sharp than everything else - but a minor thing compared to the heads and bodies being in focus.
I also like the idea of a more diagonal comp but in situations like this the straight-up-and-down also works for me. If you're any good at cloning and if it's something you don't mind doing, I'd try to get that ULC more in the same shade of green as the rest of the BG. It'd be a pretty easy fix if you're interested.
thanks for comments,Julie,I understand what you mean about the BG,and thanks for your sugestion,Jonathan the head looked a lot sharper before I uploaded it,thanks again everybody.
Another excellent behavior shot with the action covered.
Nice to see the camera is square to both beetles.
Good suggestion about the bg and in hind sight a bit higher angle for a tad more "facial" view might have also yielded a uniform bg. I find that sometimes hard to see on small screen while trying to get photo so...
Hi Christopher. This is a cool behavioral image. These might be either a type of leaf beetle (Family Chrysomelidae) or a type of soldier beetle (Family Cantharidae) - that should narrow it down to only several thousand species. It looks like the female is multi-tasking by grooming her antenna. Good job of getting both beetles within your DOF. The vertical orientation works for me, though a diagonal would also be a good option. I agree about the ULC, but it's a minor point for me. I think your image would be even stronger with proportionally more room at the top and less at the bottom, but overall, this is very well done.
Hey Christopher,
Been away so late to the party! I like this overall and yo uhave some excellent suggestions to explore. I'm fine with the OP but like Steve would prefer a bit less room behind the bugs. You could probably rotate this a few degrees CW.....then crop and get a slight digonal w/o hurting the image if you so chose. Just another option but overall.....this was very well done!