Green Immigrant Leaf Weevil

[beetleman]

A head study of Polydrusus sericeus. Very common around here this time of year (I have been waiting to see my first ). I did some cleanup on the background with the clone brush and sprayed some pixels into the right Antenna ( I did not notice it until I was done with the picture) and did some body work on him because the thorax was separating from the abdomen and left a dark gap between the two as I was posing the shot. Head and thorax area are not manipulated in any way. Stack of 89 pictures aligned in CombineZP and finished in Helicon Focus.
Live specimen here.
http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... php?t=5088

[rjlittlefield]

...aligned in CombineZP and finished in Helicon Focus.

Can you say some more words about this? CombineZP and Helicon Focus seems like a strange combination. It's along the lines of "aligned in CombineZM and stacked in TuFuse". But CombineZP already includes a pyramid algorithm similar to TuFuse, and I can't figure out what sort of finishing you'd be doing in Helicon Focus. Also I notice a pixel-level "checkerboard" artifact in the right-side antenna. I haven't seen that before except in some TuFuse output. So I'm wondering if what you said is what you meant.

Nice pose and illumination structure. The color seems too green. How did the illumination and processing compare between this stack and the live shot shown in the other gallery?

--Rik

[beetleman]

Well, basically I was just experimenting to see if aligning the stack before stacking helped out any. I don’t know that much about how the different programs work internally. I just aligned the pictures in CZ and than ran the stack in HF. I thought it came out in HF a little better. The live beetle and the stacked beetle are not the same specimen. The live one was larger, stacked one was smaller (I’m assuming it might be a male) and they do vary in scale color from my experience. The live one is showing more gold and black area than the stacked beetle. Live beetle was in full sun and stacked beetle was taken with very subdued lighting. As for the “checkerboard" artifact in the right antenna and background, I stated in the post that I did that with the clone brush in post processing (first time I used the clone brush).

[rjlittlefield]

Thanks for the info. It seems I got confused about "sprayed" and "cloned". The tools I use, that have those names, don't produce the same effect, at least when used the way I use them. Too many variables...

--Rik

[Charles Krebs]

Doug,
Pretty sure I saw a couple of these out here last year, but never did catch one. It certainly has a very interesting face and texture. I really like the pose, lighting and background. Nice job!

One suggestion... when you are setting up the lighting really pay attention to the eyes. It would be nicer to see the individual facets in the center of the near eye. Sometimes you really need to play around with reflectors to get that.

[nto]

Doug seems somewhat gloomy picture, equally good work,
this seems already reflector at the bottom, i believe that other on the right reflector as already explained by Charles

[acerola]

They are very interesting this close by. We have also something similar to this one. Good work.

[beetleman]

Thank you everyone for the great comments.

Rik Wrote:

It seems I got confused about "sprayed" and "cloned".

Well, what I was trying to do was even out the background and I was using the clone brush at 51% density and it was acting like the spray tool. I usually use the spray tool and it was the first time I used the clone tool (this is in Paint Shop Pro). I am still far behind on the post processing curve.

Charles:
You are right on with your sugestion about the eye. The trouble is, the subject is so close to the lens, I am having a real hard time getting the light on that front surface. I just beefed up on the lighting, so we will see if I can get that eliminated (or illuminated )

[lauriek]

Nice shot Doug!

A tad dark on my screen but I reckon you could sort that out with a little Levels/Curves work...

[rjlittlefield]

The trouble is, the subject is so close to the lens, I am having a real hard time getting the light on that front surface.

Try putting a sheet of crinkled aluminum foil close in front of the lens, with a hole in it that's just big enough for the lens to see through. Then be sure that enough light shines on the foil to reflect back onto the subject.

What you're looking to make is something like a Lieberkühn Reflector, see here, except more diffusing than focusing. (Focusing would be cool, but it's hard to get right.)

--Rik