A honeybee headshot, and some bumblebees

[DanK]

A few shots from the garden in the morning. The honeybee was cold, so with a bunch of tries, I managed to get a headshot. On the third one, you can clearly see the three ocelli (simple eyes, not compound) on the top of the head. Lots of flying insects have these.

100mm macro plus 20mm tube. C&C welcome, as always

[Kodiak]

C&C welcome, as always

Good grief! These look natural…;-) Very well framed!
•1. looks perfect
•2. 1/3 to 1/2 ƒ over
•3. 1/2 to 2/3 ƒover

[DanK]

Hi Kodiak,

Thanks for the comments.

I think this could be a good discussion that I would learn from. Let's take the third. Why 2/3 over? Here is the post-PP histogram:



Now here is the image--first the original, then minus half a stop, then minus 2/3 stop. It doesn't seem to me that the darker exposures are better. What would be better, it seems to me, is some targeted darkening of the flower at the lower left, which I didn't do in my rush. I'll put one with some vignetting darkening the flower but with the original exposure last in the set of four. What do you think now that you see these?

Dan

[bnnrcn]

Hi Dan I like #1 and original #3. #3 looks better with a vignette, if it was my image I would darken the pink leaves selectively with levels instead of a vignette.

[IzzieK]

As usual...beautiful shots...I like #1 best. The sharpness is perfect.

[Stagecoach]

Superb Dan.

[connaughtgreen]

very good Dan one of the reasons I love this site is plenty of encouragement and nice banter

[Kodiak]

Thanks for supplying the histogram, Dan.

Why 2/3 over? Here is the post-PP histogram:

You are right, the histogram is not clipped, and that means that no values
are over 255. That's all it means… this is an indicator of the "as is" of a shot
but that does not make the shot right. The very nice pink shades are blown
to almost a perfect white close to 255.

This version satisfies me very well… the values are better since you controlled
the high lights.
•••

As the histogram shows, there is a mass of dark tones and an other of bright
tones both separated by a well tempered and long area of medium tonal range.
I would not complain, in this case, about the dark zone being too dark but surely
about the high keys being too high.

Your demonstration is perfect, I prefer the second version of this rendition.

[Kodiak]

Hi Dan I would darken the pink leaves selectively with levels instead of a vignette.

Very good suggestion since it implies greater control!

[DanK]

Thanks very much for the helpful comments. I thin Binnur's suggestion of selective darkening is the way to go.

[chauncey]

I am a huge fan of the, rather dated, "color range command" method of making selections
https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...e+in+photoshop
Makes it super easy to tone down those bright areas any number of ways.

[Shadowman]

Nice series.

[NorthernFocus]

Awesome set, Dan. The second version of the one shot does look better with the pinks brought out a bit more. Nice job.