Over exposed butterfly?

[Jelly]

I love the clarity of this picture, but is the white on the butterfly over exposed? What might you have don differently? Is the crop too tight or just right?

Canon 300D
f/5
1/125 sec
iso 400
195 mm
no flash

[Jelly]

I just looked at a lot of photos posted by others. I need to practice more before I share!! You people are very talented. I just purchased a new macro lens and am looking forward to the spring. Maybe next time this photo will be crisper

[Optikal iLLusion]

I dont mind the crop, you could maybe bring the crop out a bit. Try it and post it here. I think it works alright being right in the middle because of the symmetric pattern of the wings. I dont necessarily think the whites are blown out either. You could try upping the recovery in Lightroom and see how you like it. There is good detail though.

[mrteacherdude]

Originally Posted by Jelly

I just looked at a lot of photos posted by others. I need to practice more before I share!! You people are very talented. I just purchased a new macro lens and am looking forward to the spring. Maybe next time this photo will be crisper

Don't worry about comparing with other people's posts here and then not posting because you don't think yours is good enough; this is intended for us to learn. And you have a nice photo

To my eyes on my monitor, it looks like some of the white spots on the wings are a tad overexposed, but not to the point where all the detail is lost. I noticed that you have done some PP work in PSE8, but don't know to what extent. I played around with your photo for a few minutes and found that it responds pretty well to adjusting the levels and running a high pass filter (very light ~0.4pixels) on it. This had a tendency to bring out and define the little blue spots on the bottom of the wings as well as help define your white spots. It also helped make your photo look crisper overall, something you thought was lacking in your posted version. I also tried increasing the contrast some but I'm not sure if it really benefited much from that. If you decide to "play" with it some more, be sure you go back to your original file, make the adjustments, and then "save as" a different file name. Forgive me if you already know this.

I personally find the composition fine. More often than not, the subject of a macro or closeup is the subject. That is, tight framing so the subject fills the frame generally seems most appropriate.

[Jelly]

Thanks for the input