Praying Mantis in March???

[d'mur]

I thought praying mantis's died off in the fall, so was really surprised to find this full-grown adult in my yard today! I guess he had never seen a camera before, 'cause he just couldn't keep his eyes off of me. It was quite the photo shoot.

D

[d'mur]

For some reason, these don't look nearly as sharp as they do in my picture viewer. If you have any ideas, let me know! Thanks...

D

[Bama]

The sharpness looks good on my monitor...
IMO, the contrast and sharpening needs boosting up.

Nice shot of my favorite critter.

Regards
bama

[dazzlebea]

Love the first one, D. The second shot is funny though.

Actually the first shot seems pretty sharp to me. But if you see a difference it could have something to do with saving it for the web.

You didn't have any problems with the wind today? Over at my house things just wouldn't stay still:(

[melvynyeo]

Wonderful find :D I like both of them.

[Bald Eagle]

I look for these, every time I go out. Excellent captures here. To me, they look sharp.:D :D :D

[sam walker]

I thought praying mantis's died off in the fall, so was really surprised to find this full-grown adult in my yard today! I guess he had never seen a camera before, 'cause he just couldn't keep his eyes off of me. It was quite the photo shoot.

D I've never seen one here in March but then I'm much futher behind the frost curve than you. I see adults in June/July. Great shots BTW.
Sam

[pvibes]

I love the 2nd shot, that is funny.
Your praying mantis looks like it has a great sense of humour.

Trish

[LordV]

Excellent captures. Just wish we had them here :)
Brian V.

[dpastern]

Nice shots, although, to my eyes, both shots look slightly out of focus, although truth be told, I'm pretty sure it's my crappy monitor. Good find and I like the composition!

Dave

[Omri Alon]

I like the first one :D Good job!

[JMAS]

The mantis is such an interesting subject. Very nice photos. I'd boost a bit the contrast (maybe USM 15;60;7).

[d'mur]

Thank you all for your kind words. In a bit I will mess with the sharpening a bit. I have only been using PS's RAW editor for sharpening. Do you all also use the unsharp mask? I haven't quite figured that out.

In answer to your question, Bea, the wind wasn't too bad here. Although it was enough, along with the mantis' weight, to flip the leaf of the daffodil upside down! Hence the funny upside down shot.

D

[Action_Man]

They look a little OOF, why dont you link them through Imageshack at a higher resolution than is allowed here ? ...

[pxl8]

Generally you need to do some sharpening as re-sizing for the web will soften the image. A bit of USM will do wonders but there's no hard and fast rules as to what values to use - it varies from one image to the next. As a starting point try a radius of 0.6, an amount of 100, and a clip value of 7. Watch out for "halos" where dark edges suddenly get a bright edge next to them (or vice versa) if you notice them you've probably gone too far.

[JMAS]

I had a quick go with selective USM (only arround the mantis and flower+leaf) to try to show you what I meant earlier.

[Athena]

I love the second one. What a character. I don't get to see many critters like that in our yard. We adopted a soi mah (means street dog in Thai) and he EATS most of the little critters - even when there is food in his dish. I guess you can take the mah out of the soi, but not the soi out of the mah. ;)

[Bama]

I had a quick go with selective USM (only arround the mantis and flower+leaf) to try to show you what I meant earlier.

Did you obtain this through the initial contrast recommended settings of 15,60,7.

There is a very good improvement in the picture through your method.

Regards
Bama

[JMAS]

Did you obtain this through the initial contrast recommended settings of 15,60,7.

There is a very good improvement in the picture through your method.

Regards
Bama

Yes I did, only it was 16,60,7, only applied to the mantis and flower+leaft.

[d'mur]

Jaime, Your unsharp mask is a definite improvement. What anoys me is that on my original you can actually see little bands all around his antennae. They are completely lost here. I really should offer a link to a higher res photo, as was mentioned earlier.

And Athena, I actually stumbled across this little guy. I had just put my macro lens on the camera to photograph a flower, when I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye. There he was, watching me. I guess girls like us only notice the big critters like the 3" praying mantis or the 6" tokay gecko. Perhaps we don't look close enough on purpose...

[JMAS]

Jaime, Your unsharp mask is a definite improvement. What anoys me is that on my original you can actually see little bands all around his antennae. They are completely lost here.

I uderstand and that is why I didn't sharpen the antennae.

If I were to try that it would have to be with another USM setting (lighter) just for the antennae.

[Mick Emmett]

USM is a widely over used and abused tool; it can be helpful in certain cases if the picture is pretty good to start with, there are many of other ways to improve or highlight the relivant sections of the picture you wish to push forward. The first picture here is by use of brighteness/contrast manipulation and a little selective colour twiddleing, not meant as an improvement but just a differant approach to highlighting the bug. Another popular route is to desaturate the background around the subject so it highlights the section of the shot you want to draw peoples eyes to, this can turn a really poor shot into some thing worth keeping. We don't seem to get many obviously PS'd shots in macro for some reason even though I'm sure most of the regulars here will be quite proficiant at image manipulation, I'm not trying to teach Grandmothers to suck eggs here am I.
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[Bama]

Yes I did, only it was 16,60,7, only applied to the mantis and flower+leaft.

hi there JMAS,

could you describe how you applied the selective USM. I understand how dodge/burn works or how to remove selective unwanted background. how do you do it on sharpening

regards
bama

[d'mur]

Mick, I really like what you did with the first image. I'm not sure I care for the b&w background in the second, but it sure makes my little friend stand out! I guess I really need to get back to PS and clean this baby up.

Thanks~D

[kallousa]

Good shots and nice poses. It depends on how sharp you like shots to be . For me they need more saturation.

Keep them coming

Regards