Eupholus schoenherrii

Images taken in a controlled environment or with a posed subject. All subject types.

Moderators: rjlittlefield, ChrisR, Chris S., Pau

perdu34
Posts: 50
Joined: Fri Nov 25, 2016 7:03 am

Eupholus schoenherrii

Post by perdu34 »

This is my weekend project that lasted from Wednesday to Monday.

ImageEupholus schoenherriiFlickr.jpg by Lucas Black, on Flickr

Canon 5Diii
Canon 65mm MP-E at 5x
Canon Twin flash plus Yonguno Flash
ISO 200
f8
1/160s

58 stacks in total, produced in Helicon and merged in photoshop.

I'm pretty happy with the lighting, but need to work on the sharpness of the left flank. Another column of stacks with the left flank in the centre may be the key. Something to try next time.

mawyatt
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Post by mawyatt »

Absolutely beautiful image!! How did you get this image so big?

Thought the size was limited to 1024 pixels by 1024 pixels with a max image size of 300KB.

Best,

Mike
Research is like a treasure hunt, you don't know where to look or what you'll find!
~Mike

Smokedaddy
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Post by Smokedaddy »

Excellent!

ChrisR
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Post by ChrisR »

mawyatt wrote:Absolutely beautiful image!! How did you get this image so big?

Thought the size was limited to 1024 pixels by 1024 pixels with a max image size of 300KB.

Best,

Mike
Those are the forum rules (so that images don't go off the screen). This one is an external (flickr) image so isn't reduced.
Chris R

Lou Jost
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Post by Lou Jost »

Beautiful. I am most impressed by how you kept it free of dust during all that! The beetle is spotless.

razashaikh
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Post by razashaikh »

Stunning shot.

rjlittlefield
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Post by rjlittlefield »

Welcome aboard -- the image looks great!

The combination of f/8 and 5X gives effective aperture f/48. That is seriously in diffraction territory even on a 5D Mark III (full frame, 22.3 megapixels). I expect your images would be sharper if shot at f/5.6, but you would have to shoot more source frames to make up for the shallower DOF per frame.

It's unclear to me why you're thinking that another column of stacks would help. Is your MP-E 65 significantly less sharp in edges & corners than at center?

--Rik

Chris S.
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Post by Chris S. »

Lucas, this is a lovely image! :smt038 Thanks for posting it.

Do you mind if I nitpick a few details?
  • 1. Would you consider displaying a smaller image on our forum, with click-to-view the larger image at flickr? At present, I can't view the whole image without changing screen-scaling. While this is not difficult, I fear that some members will not see your image in its (impressive) entirety. This is a reason behind our 1024-pixel limit.

    2. The bottom portion of the insect appears to be lit more brightly than the top. (This may be an illusion due to changes in light placement--but if so, it is a convincing illusion.) My sense is that the photograph would be even stronger if the light appeared even throughout. (Particularly when bearing in mind that we evolved in a world where sunlight comes from above, so the brightest portion of a subject tends to be sensed as its top.)

    3. If I understand correctly, you created this image by stack and stitch, and made lighting changes between stacks to optimize modeling for individual portions of your subject. If so, I think these lighting changes need to be aggressively disclosed and explained. (Why? Because light--assumed by the human eye to come from an unchanging source for a single image--reveals information about the subject. When the lighting is changed, detail by detail, the resultant image may be aesthetically pleasing, but the information conveyed by it will be somewhere between confusing and false. I'm aware that there exists a macro-photographer, popular on the Internet, who does stack and stitch and changes his light stack by stack, and that many people wish to emulate him. I think his approach, while not intentially misleading, does mislead in practice because his work is usually published without disclosure of his methods in a way that non-photographers can understand. Here in our forum, I'd hope we can do better.
Nitpicks aside, I love your image! Thanks for posting. :D

--Chris S.

perdu34
Posts: 50
Joined: Fri Nov 25, 2016 7:03 am

Post by perdu34 »

rjlittlefield wrote:Welcome aboard -- the image looks great!

The combination of f/8 and 5X gives effective aperture f/48. That is seriously in diffraction territory even on a 5D Mark III (full frame, 22.3 megapixels). I expect your images would be sharper if shot at f/5.6, but you would have to shoot more source frames to make up for the shallower DOF per frame.

It's unclear to me why you're thinking that another column of stacks would help. Is your MP-E 65 significantly less sharp in edges & corners than at center?

--Rik

Hi Rik,

Thanks for the welcome, I'm a long term listener first time caller.

Yes, you're right, f8 and 5x is diffraction limited but it was the first setting that was exposed in my test shots so didn't change it afterwards. Note for next time.

The want for an extra column of images is due to my bad habit of not seeing the real end of the stack when it's close to the edge of my screen. This means there are a few stacks where I've not gone far enough in.

L

perdu34
Posts: 50
Joined: Fri Nov 25, 2016 7:03 am

Post by perdu34 »

Chris S. wrote:Lucas, this is a lovely image! :smt038 Thanks for posting it.

Do you mind if I nitpick a few details?
  • 1. Would you consider displaying a smaller image on our forum, with click-to-view the larger image at flickr? At present, I can't view the whole image without changing screen-scaling. While this is not difficult, I fear that some members will not see your image in its (impressive) entirety. This is a reason behind our 1024-pixel limit.

    2. The bottom portion of the insect appears to be lit more brightly than the top. (This may be an illusion due to changes in light placement--but if so, it is a convincing illusion.) My sense is that the photograph would be even stronger if the light appeared even throughout. (Particularly when bearing in mind that we evolved in a world where sunlight comes from above, so the brightest portion of a subject tends to be sensed as its top.)

    3. If I understand correctly, you created this image by stack and stitch, and made lighting changes between stacks to optimize modeling for individual portions of your subject. If so, I think these lighting changes need to be aggressively disclosed and explained. (Why? Because light--assumed by the human eye to come from an unchanging source for a single image--reveals information about the subject. When the lighting is changed, detail by detail, the resultant image may be aesthetically pleasing, but the information conveyed by it will be somewhere between confusing and false. I'm aware that there exists a macro-photographer, popular on the Internet, who does stack and stitch and changes his light stack by stack, and that many people wish to emulate him. I think his approach, while not intentially misleading, does mislead in practice because his work is usually published without disclosure of his methods in a way that non-photographers can understand. Here in our forum, I'd hope we can do better.
Nitpicks aside, I love your image! Thanks for posting. :D

--Chris S.
Hi Chris,

Happy to post at 1024 pixels. As soon as I find the right setting on flickr to export the bbcode.

So 2 and 3 are the same answer. The lighting was kept the same throughout the imaging process. The Yongnuo was on the bottom and the twin canon was at 10 and 2 on the clock face. So the being lit from below was an active choice as I kinda like uplighting.

I hope that answers your queries.

L

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