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After being frustrated with a shortage of insects and my new Sigma 150 lens yesterday. Today I went for a look and found some green ants.

Click to enlarge




Could have tried for the whole body and antenna in focus in the second.

Please feel free with the C+C as this is all new territory for me. I also got my SB-800 and I'm only starting to learn that using to

Two excellent ant images here. Both are sharp where they need to be and the background is not distracting. The lighting is pretty good, too, although could probably be toned back just a tad with a diffuser or a soft box.

Well done You'll be walking around looking at the ground and in the trees now just waiting to find some insects
I agree with Andrew, the only other thing I can recommend is a levels/curve adjustment in PS - will really bring out the colours in the shot and make it 'pop', giving some definition to the ant.
Welcome to the land of macro
Hugs
rel

Thanks for the feed back.

I didn't adjust the curves as I liked the natural colours, but I understand what you mean.

I was using the built in diffuser. Would you recommend something better or should I perhaps use the clip on diffuser that came with the SB-800?

dm_td5 wrote:I was using the built in diffuser. Would you recommend something better or should I perhaps use the clip on diffuser that came with the SB-800?

The built in diffuser has softened the lighting already, but ideally you want something that will spread the source of the light over a larger area so you don't get a point light source which causes harsh shadows.

You can build a diffuser from cardboard and paper, like my soft box or blokeman's. Or you can go with something like Rel's PJ Lightsphere.

Ooooh they are both great!!!! Great DOF in the first one... I love it!

Thanks very much for that info.

My German's not to good (link in the soft box site) but there's pictures that help. I've got a lot of reading, learning and playing to do.