Myra says tighter crop on the bottom and burn those light areas.

[JBW]

[Shadowman]

She's right, don't fight it.

[bnnrcn]

Wise wife

[Geoff F]

But there are potential problems with those edits, Brian.

A crop means a different size ratio. You could crop tighter at the left side and bottom but that risks having the cricket's head too close to the edge for an ideal composition. Should have asked her to pull those hind legs a bit forward before you shot!

Toning down bright reflections on leaves can look unnatural if you aren't careful. That is another case where I use layers and masking plus a layer blend mode change.

Start with an adjustment layer (or a duplicate image layer) and adjust for the bright areas. Change the blend mode to Luminosity (or whatever it is called in Gimp) then add a hide all mask. Edit the mask to just apply to the required areas.

By using the Luminosity mode you are only changing the brightness not the saturation as well; which helps to prevent the edited areas looking flat and colourless.

[JBW]

But there are potential problems with those edits, Brian.

A crop means a different size ratio. You could crop tighter at the left side and bottom but that risks having the cricket's head too close to the edge for an ideal composition. Should have asked her to pull those hind legs a bit forward before you shot!

Toning down bright reflections on leaves can look unnatural if you aren't careful. That is another case where I use layers and masking plus a layer blend mode change.

Start with an adjustment layer (or a duplicate image layer) and adjust for the bright areas. Change the blend mode to Luminosity (or whatever it is called in Gimp) then add a hide all mask. Edit the mask to just apply to the required areas.

By using the Luminosity mode you are only changing the brightness not the saturation as well; which helps to prevent the edited areas looking flat and colourless.

I did try to get her to tuck in but she was rightly proud of her legs. As for the masks I shall give them a try.