A few weeks ago, out of boredom, I decided to make an impromptu trip to the Butterfly Park in KL. Did some macro shots of the butterfly and managed to get some other insects as well.
I made a mistake during the shots and only realized once I got back home. What happen was, the night before, I was messing around with the settings in my camera. I had accidentally left the ISO setting at 1600. When I downloaded the pictures into my computer, only then I noticed that the noise was quite high.
All in all, I think I took about 300 plus shots, and only 50 came out good. The remaining 250 quickly ended up in the trash can.
I posted some of the pictures on ShutterAsia and among the feedback I received are
- noise + soft
- noise is too high
- all pictures are too soft .. u may need Post Process to make ur main object sharpen
- Soft = not sharp..
- You need to pay attention to:
1) Aperture for optimum sharpness and good DoF
2) Shutter speed to avoid hand shake
3) Adequate and directional light to give texture
4) Correct exposure to avoid loss of shadow/highlight
5) Post processing sharpening for original detail and down-sizing - Good attempt. Noise for ISO 1600 looks reasonable.
It's better to invest on a flash gun or wait for the butterflies to be out in the open. Shooting insect macro with natural lighting is quite demanding.
Be aware to always focus on the eyes, and try to increase your DOF by narrowing your apertures further. Else, you may want to shoot the insects on a right plane (better DOF for the entire insect). - Here's a few tips, based on your fotos..
1 - to increase the dof (ie keep more of the subject within the sharp portion of the focal plane) you need to use a higher F-stop eg F11 , F16 etc. But at the same time try not to exceed F16 as beyond that, you will have lens diffraction will will also lead to a blurred image. Most of the time I shoot at around F11 to F13. And to do that you need either a flash or high iSO.
2 - Keep your shutter speed to at least 1/150 sec. Anything below this will lead to blurred images on account of handshake. Your pix #3 indicated that you shot at 1/15 sec. At this speed you gotta be Robocop or have a tripod to avoid blurred images.
3 - Most of us use either full manual or TV (aperture priority) for shooting insects and other macros. Shutter speed is usually fixed at 1/200 (if using flash) or a minimum of 1/100 if you have steady hands.
4 - Wait for the insect to rest with the body perpendicular to your lens or directly facing you. This way more of the critical parts of the insect will be withing the sharp focal plane.
5 - If you don't have a flash, shoot only when the insect is in a bright area. Else you'll be cussing yourself back at home when you process the images. I'll rather get less shots but good ones, than to have many that were sharply focussed or with good composition but ending up throwing them in the re-cycle bin due to gross under-exposure or handshake. Remember - sometimes less shooting means more good shots.
Those are some of the feedback I received from the guys at
ShutterAsia. Gonna keep them in mind during my next trip out to the Butterfly Park.
Below are some pictures that I took on that day. Enjoy them and please feel free to comment on them.
More pictures can be viewed here :
Kuala Lumpur Butterfly Park (4 May 2008)
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