Ladybug shot... need a bit of help

KonicaKyle · Mar 24, 2007

Was out messing about in the sun today with the camera and followed this little fellow about for while. I managed to (purely by chance) capture him mid take-off. Sadly however the lighting wasnt perfect...

If anyone would like to edit it to make it look nicer, or advise me on what to do I'd be most grateful

Thanks!

LaFoto · Mar 24, 2007

This is such a lovely photo that it is a pleasure to work with it, though working from this downsized version as my only basis is, of course, not quite so easy. Hence my crop suggestion makes the resulting image really small.

I tried to selectively (feathered lasso at 15px this time) brighten the ladybird and later - by using the same method - to take away a bit of the glare from the wood. I don`t know how well I succeded, here is my edit:

Ah, I straightened and sharpened it a bit, too.

JTHphoto · Mar 24, 2007

neat capture, i really like lafoto's version, which is similar to what I was originally thinking, straightening and recropping the ladybug out of the center of the shot. You could also try cropping him into the lower third of the frame so you can see above him where he will be flying. Since LaFoto's edit was so close to what I was thinking i tried something completely different. 15 degree rotation to the left, crop, dodge&burn, levels adjustment, saturation up about 10-15, and cloned out that squiggly in the plank above him...

JTHphoto · Mar 24, 2007

pretty much the same deal, but the crop was bothering me, he needs more room for take off...

and with a diffuse glow/gaussian blur on a duplicate layer underneath, top layer set to 70% opacity...

Canoncan · Mar 24, 2007

KonicaKyle · Mar 24, 2007

Thanks for all your advice, some nice edits there! I'll have to have a play about!

Kyle

ravikiran · Mar 24, 2007

Fine photo Konicakyle.
And guys I'am learning PS. Help us with more edits.
Thank you.

KonicaKyle · Mar 24, 2007

Well I played around a bit just on iPhoto and finished with this... it looks a lot better I think!

tpe · Mar 24, 2007

How about like this? Hopefully it got some of the other colours out, duplicated a layer and set it to colour and then adjusted the colour ballance of the layer below

tim

KonicaKyle · Mar 24, 2007

mm yeah i like that, It really brings out some of the detail in the ladybug.

Rathbone · Mar 24, 2007

Great! Doesn't it give you a nice rush when the subject obliges you with a rarely seen moment frozen in time? I know from my own photography that you cannot set out to take a pic like this, but sometimes your diligence is rewarded by the ladybug taking flight just as you hit the shutter button because if you wait until she moves she is gone before the shutter mechanism clicks. It takes a lot of practice to be able to anticipate this sort of thing and even then it's NOT EASY!

And we have the same camera, too! "Hand steadying pills"? LOL ....sure we joke but I know where you're coming from. I find a beer steadies me nicely.

Keep up the good work!

KonicaKyle · Mar 25, 2007

Well I wish I could put it down to diligence, but I'm afraid it's down to luck I think! I was just lying on my decking (in a lot of pain due to the uneven wood surface) following the little guy around and got a few others of him (see below), and then i just clicked and he was off! A millisecond later and I would have got him with both wings up, which would have been quite something! But he I can't complain with how it turned out!

And as for the beer to steady my hand, well it was about 9 in the morning, I can't say it would have gone down too well!

Here's another I got of him..

For whatever reason the other raised bits of wood are all blurred except for one straight line going across... perhaps it was due to a natural curve in the wood or something... I'm just not sure really!