Not Getting anywhere ...seriously!

discarded my belows for today and used a bit bigger suspect for practise, a dead Cicada, female, already dead when i found it so no harm was done to it.

100 MM lens, 5D mark II, 430 EX II flash from left and above, 50 images stacked with zerene, edited in light room and photoshop.

any tips for improvement appreciated

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I don't think there's anything that could be done to improve the image sharpness-wise, but the lighting seems too harsh. Diffusing the flash with a paper towel seems to be the method of choice on these forums for softening lighting; I certainly find it makes a great improvement in my images.

Change the subject Her arms! Her arms are missing!

Here's a live specimen, no stacking, for parts checking : Tamron SP 2.5/90 (52B) + 5Dc -- Cicada

I can't see anything wrong with this result, other than it looks a little over-sharp to me.

Melanopsin....LOL....i​ts a dead example, i am sure many parts are missing/damaged etc.

Was taken at home on the dining table, what I think is wrong in my eyes here, is:
1. lighting too harsh
2. over sharpened (will have to re-edit)
3. some areas where focus is wrong, i.e. its left eye and mouth area, dont know why this happened...
4. the way the wings show up blueish which isnt like it is really
5. background is grey and not black even though i flagged it heavily.

blown highlights, need more flash diffusion.

as other mentionned, the lighting is too harsh... although a question of taste, I find black backgrounds highly un-appealing and is something I never aim for, I usually discard any shots that has flash falloff with a black background. I mention this because from your point "5" I am under the impression that you were aiming at having a black background.

the hind bottom part, you can see where you have stopped retouching right before the bristles, these hairy zones are always touchy to fix with the stack, but it is worth taking the time.

Last, I do not believe that you would really need 50 shots for this image and sometimes, I find it nicer not to have the full animal in sharp focus, but of course, again that is subjective.

For a dead animal, I would avoid showing parts that clearly gives away it is dead, like the curles legs, I would have concentrated on a portrait of the face. It makes the picture more appealing.

Martin

racketman wrote in post #12644423
blown highlights, need more flash diffusion.

Or bounce some of the flash light to reduce contrast.