Damselfly

Randy - I like how you managed to come so parallel to the body of the Damsel.

This is obviously a very tough exposure situation and I have come across it myself shooting these Jewel wings. A very weak flash (stronger would create hot spots in the wings) and creative processing is what I have done.

I am sure other members will offer more ideas.

Answers, if you have Photoshop

1. Requested—Select the wing. CTRL J (in PS). Levels adjustment>lighten to taste>flatten the image
2. Not requested—If you have CS6 or CC {I'm not sure CS5 has this feature)>Content aware patch selection of the dark area in the URHC>drag down frame until the selection is entirely in the yellow green>release. La voila, you have a seamless patch covering the dark and a suitable boundary, which hopefully you included in the patch selection.

Unfortunately, if your processing ends in LR4, you can do none of the above, as they depend on selection and layers. You might do this in Elements, except the Patch selection. That you would have to do with a clone brush.

Ram, thank you for the suggestion about the flash. It would help to show much more detail. I have rarely added flash to my macro shooting yet, but know that it will be a welcome addition starting in Spring 2013.

Phil, thank you or the Photoshop processing suggestions. Currently, my post-processing ends in LR4, and I have not used Photoshop, by my wife has the CC version on her iMac, so I'll ask if I can borrow the computer for a while to start learning how to use the product.

A good comp and overall presentation of this damselfly, Randy, in tricky lighting. I don't do any processing in LR, so I can't help you there. In PS, in addition to the great suggestions by Phil, you can also try the shadow/highlights slider for a quick adjustment. If nothing else, I would try burning the tip of the leaf as well as the light area above it.

Your patience shows in the great details of the legs and face. Under these lighting conditions, there's not much you can do to get detail in the wings or show the iridescence in the body, short of fill flash. To get such details to show with natural light, you need over the shoulder light or a high thin clouds. If the wings are black in the raw file (and I expect under this light that they are) there's nothing in post processing that will help. Brightening the wings with the shadows and blacks sliders (whether in LR or PS) will only create noise. If you're not shooting in raw, then you probably have lost subtle details during the in--camera conversion, especially if you're converting to JPG. The hot spots on the leaf create a similar problem, if they are completely white, burning them in will only turn them an unnatural grey. That can be fixed in LR4 by cloning in some color using the spot removal brush at a low (5 - 20%) opacity.

Thanks, Scott and Mark, for the additional suggestions. You have given me a few ideas to improve this image, and future images during capture.

The lights direction was not in your favor Randy, it looks like it was from directly above.
The only way you could shoot in light like this is using flash as mentioned.
Or you can try shooting earlier/later putting that sun behind you..
Once you've lost the detail to UE, not much you can do in PS.