Grasshopper Portraiture

[JBW]

Grasshopper Portraiture: Grasshoppers have character. They have an abundance of character. This one deserved a portrait.

Sony Alpha a68 ~ Tamron 90mm 272E Macro Lens ~ ISO 100 ~ Shutter Speed 0.8s ~ F/16 ~ Exposure Compensation 0.0 ~ Natural Light

This fellow has been hanging around in different locations for three of four days. Each day in a better location. We will see what tomorrow brings.

Shot in our garden/temple somewhere in the Philippines.

Brian

[Stagecoach]

Grasshopper Portraiture: Grasshoppers have character. They have an abundance of character. This one deserved a portrait.

Love it Brian, this is one of your best. We do not always need to see the entire critter where their character rarely stands out.

What I will say is that this image deserves and can take further PP to improve it even more.

Grahame

[Shadowman]

Nice effort.

[Cogito]

What I will say is that this image deserves and can take further PP to improve it even more.
Grahame

Possibly a bit like this?

[Stagecoach]

Possibly a bit like this?

Absolutely not, that makes it simply look over processed !

[JBW]

Love it Brian, this is one of your best. We do not always need to see the entire critter where their character rarely stands out.

What I will say is that this image deserves and can take further PP to improve it even more.

Grahame

Okay, somewhere between Cogitos effort and mine is the Goldilocks solution. Give me some hints please and thank-you

[Stagecoach]

Okay, somewhere between Cogitos effort and mine is the Goldilocks solution. Give me some hints please and thank-you

Ok Brian,

To me the image has everything there but a bit of impact. Put simply it looks a bit flat and my thoughts are to undertake 'subtle' changes, keeping it 'natural looking' rather than a simple heavy global increase of contrast making it look cartoon-ish.

So to start with I would add a 'very minor' amount of contrast globally.

I would then 'selectively' increase sharpness/contrast/structure of the in focus areas of the mouth/eyes/antennae. In doing this I would take care not to do the edges but to treat it as you would a female portrait, e.g. emphasising the eyes/teeth. This draws your eyes to those parts without making the rest of it look overdone.

As an example, for the antennae you would do the centre portion but not the edges.

[JBW]

Grasshopper Portraiture: Grasshoppers have character. They have an abundance of character. This one deserved a portrait.

Sony Alpha a68 ~ Tamron 90mm 272E Macro Lens ~ ISO 100 ~ Shutter Speed 0.8s ~ F/16 ~ Exposure Compensation 0.0 ~ Natural Light

This fellow has been hanging around in different locations for three of four days. Each day in a better location. We will see what tomorrow brings.

Shot in our garden/temple somewhere in the Philippines.

Brian

Stagecoach, I worked on the shot before I read your suggestions. Strangely I incorporated any of your suggestions. I didn't work individually on the antennae or the eyes for sharpening or brightness wanting to keep the face a whole cloth.

But I'm more than willing to go hack for take three.

[FootLoose]

It certainly has character, Brian.

[Stagecoach]

Stagecoach, I worked on the shot before I read your suggestions. Strangely I incorporated any of your suggestions. I didn't work individually on the antennae or the eyes for sharpening or brightness wanting to keep the face a whole cloth.

But I'm more than willing to go hack for take three.

Your second working of it Brian is an improvement and IMO the way to go.

For info, here's the one I did, but had to put it back and remove those specular highlights as you did

[JBW]

Your second working of it Brian is an improvement and IMO the way to go.

For info, here's the one I did, but had to put it back and remove those specular highlights as you did

Not sure if secular bright spots or just dirt. Looks like I've got to go back and work on thew eyes and antenae.

[Manfred M]

Excellent capture Brian. I agree with Grahame that the image looks flat. With flat images, tweaking the black point and white point often makes a big difference in what the image looks like. That will increase contrast and more contrast is often what an image needs. All I've done to your original is make that adjustment; the amount that works for you is something you have to decide.

[JBW]

Excellent capture Brian. I agree with Grahame that the image looks flat. With flat images, tweaking the black point and white point often makes a big difference in what the image looks like. That will increase contrast and more contrast is often what an image needs. All I've done to your original is make that adjustment; the amount that works for you is something you have to decide.

I did tweak them though more the black than the white here's the latest version of my tweaking.



PS: this may well be a first... your tweak is darker than mine

[Manfred M]

I did tweak them though more the black than the white here's the latest version of my tweaking.

I look at the histogram to do this work and it depends on what it does, to some extent. In general people find an image that has more contrast looks better (to a point).

PS: this may well be a first... your tweak is darker than mine

Yes and no. The background is darker in my version. The highlights are brighter. In some of your images that I critiqued, the whole image was darker, not just the background.

[mugge]

A grasshopper with a snooty face! I am in dire need of a Talisker
Cheers Ole

[JBW]

A grasshopper with a snooty face! I am in dire need of a Talisker
Cheers Ole

you'd only end up seeing more than 1 of them