Bee on flower (RAW)

scitch · Post by **scitch** » Sun Oct 03, 2010 10:35 pm

I was considering that I would not put this in the beginner's section because I've been here for a while. But then I saw Gustavo's bee pictures elsewhere and decided that this is a better place for it.

This is my backyard, these flowers are growing along a fence and attract a lot of bees. But only bees, not much else. I may have over-sharpened.

The second picture is of one of the flowers just breaking through. I was going to post it as a "what is this" picture, but the bee picture would have given it away.

The third is the full picture to give you some context for the cropped 2nd picture. It also helps show that my PhotoShop skills are improving. I was able to remove the motion blur fairly well.

Sony A200, Tamron 90mm, 68 mm extension tubes, Hot Shoe Flash, F/7.1, 1/13 sec, ISO-200, cropped to approx 75% original size

Sony A200, Tamron 90mm, 68 mm extension tubes, Hot Shoe Flash, F/11, 1/13 sec, ISO-200, cropped significantly

Sony A200, Tamron 90mm, 68 mm extension tubes, Hot Shoe Flash, F/11, 1/13 sec, ISO-200, cropped slightly

I was finally talked into trying shooting in RAW and all 3 of these were shot that way. I did some color, exposure, and sharpness editing. Then I saved as JPG and did some cropping and other editing in CS5.

sonyalpha · Post by **sonyalpha** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 12:08 am

Well done Scitch:

Your focussing is good:

Looking at these from my intermediate viewpoint it seems that you have fallen into the trap that I did early on:

Namely that everything is far too bright....whether over exposed in the camera or over brightened afterwards:

If it is the former you need to make yourself a flash reflector diffuser to soften that very harsh light:

If you are being too heavy with brightening in Photoshop then experiment a little with saturation, curves, and colour balance; sometimes one or more of the Auto settings will save the day:

Camera settings can be experimented with too..........my favourites at the moment are f16 or f14 S160.....or.......f11 s160.........with ISO levels between 100 and 200:

Other member will have other suggestions no doubt:

Please keep your posts coming:

sonyalpha

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 1:06 am

sonyalpha wrote: Namely that everything is far too bright....whether over exposed in the camera or over brightened afterwards:

Too bright, yes. Far too bright is rather harsh. I suggest that as little as half a stop darker would give good colour saturation.

Harold

scitch · Post by **scitch** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 8:46 am

I completely agree about the brightness. But the thing that I couldn't figure out is . . . every time I lowered the exposure or the brightness, the interfacetal hairs practically disappeared. So it was either no hairs and a well-exposed body or hairs and an over-exposed body. So, I tried using "fill-lights" in the RAW settings to help. My eyes are drawn straight to the eyes, so I didn't pay much attention to the brightness of the rest of the image.
These were taken about 2 hours before sunset in the shade. Here's another version with exposure set at -1.33 and gamma correction at 0.89 (not from the original RAW file, but from the jpeg above).

Mike

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 9:13 am

Mike,

I would say that your second version of the image is about a stop darker and too dark. About halfway between the two should be about right.

Harold

DaveW · Post by **DaveW** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 11:12 am

Not too sure the bee is entirely in focus, but I just tried your image in Photoshop Elements and sharpened it a bit which improves it. Try sharpening it in your post processing software, say using unsharp mask.

http://www.scantips.com/simple6.html

DaveW

scitch · Post by **scitch** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 12:18 pm

Dave, can you post your sharpened version? I sharpened it up quite a bit in the RAW processing and then more with "Smart Sharpening" in PS CS5. I'll have to read more to learn how to use the unsharp mask. I've seen it, but never used it bc of the name. I thought, "Why would someone want to 'unsharp' a photo?" Maybe when I get home, I'll convert the original stright to jpg and shrink it to show what the original looked like and then someone can get it looking good and tell me the steps that they followed and the settings they used.
I am beginning to think that part of the problem might be my computer monitors. I swear that both of these images looked pretty decent at home. I'm looking at them on the Blackberry now and they look exactly as you guys describe (too bright and way too dark). Maybe I'll have to work on calibrating my monitors to the camera LCD.

I'll keep working. Thanks for the feedback.
Mike

DaveW · Post by **DaveW** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 1:45 pm

I deleted your image off my computer after I tried it since they don't like people posting additional images on other peoples posts here.

First then calibrate your monitor. If its LCD try this:-

http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/

If CRT:-

http://www.photofriday.com/calibrate.php

For sharpening:-

http://www.imaging-resource.com/TIPS/SHARPEN/SHARP1.HTM

The problem with in camera JPEG's is they loose quality every time you save them after working on them. You have more flexibility with a RAW image.

DaveW

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 5:53 pm

scitch,

Here is a quick tickle of your image using the 'Curves' dialogue box in Photoshop CS4. Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Curves.

I also converted the original Adobe RGB profile to sRGB for uploading to the web.

Craig

scitch · Post by **scitch** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 6:22 pm

Thanks, Craig. I can see on the phone that the brightness looks good. It's a little too red, but you couldn't know that since you weren't there to see the bee. I cannot see any details to know how it affected the eyes bc the picture is so small on the blackberry screen.

I'll do some reading on all of this as it's way beyond me right now. I'll also try to calibrate my monitor soon.

Mike

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Mon Oct 04, 2010 10:48 pm

scitch wrote:Thanks, Craig. I can see on the phone that the brightness looks good. It's a little too red, but you couldn't know that since you weren't there to see the bee. I cannot see any details to know how it affected the eyes bc the picture is so small on the blackberry screen.

The brightness is about right but it is too red for a honeybee. The eye hair detail is similar to that of the first image.

Harold

DaveW · Post by **DaveW** » Tue Oct 05, 2010 2:31 am

I get the impression its simply that the head hairs are out of focus. To me it looks as though focus was on the second sector of the bottom leg. Its always chance whether you have the best parts of the image in focus when you press the shutter button since insects move and depth of field is often so small.

DaveW

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Tue Oct 05, 2010 8:11 am

Focus aside, what intrigues me about this bee picture is the apparent dent in the front leg, just below the knee.

Harold, is this normal anatomy for a bee, and if not do you know whether it's a common defect or injury?

--Rik

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Tue Oct 05, 2010 8:45 am

rjlittlefield wrote:Focus aside, what intrigues me about this bee picture is the apparent dent in the front leg, just below the knee.

Harold, is this normal anatomy for a bee, and if not do you know whether it's a common defect or injury?

Rik,

There is an antennae cleaner on the front leg but is should be on the inside. I don't know whether it is a twisted or malformed leg or just has a dent.

http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultran ... sects.html

Harold