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Argiope Trifasciata

Gallery: Macro & Close-upPosted November 17, 2016185 views10 comments

Or Banded Garden Argiope. My wife gave me an early Christmas present of the Zerene Stacker software and this is my first real use of it and it's editing capabilities. This is a six-image stack. In retrospect a bit more dof would have been nice, or perhaps a few more slices as there are a couple of places that aren't quite as sharp as they could be.

5DIII, Canon 180mm f/3.5L macro, tripod with ballhead and cable release, f/7.1, 1/800, iso 500 on the images. Stacked in Zerene Stacker and post stack processing in LR5 & CS6. Full width, but I cropped the height to get a 4x5 aspect ratio. Taken on a local nature preserve at 8:33 AM on November 8th.

Comments and criticisms are always appreciated.

Thanks,

Comments

10 comments

Comment posted by Igor Hoveijn on November 17, 2016 at 3:22 PM

Looks like the spider is in focus and all dew drops on it. Maybe not all of the web is in focus, but that is not necessary imho. But I can imagine that now you have Zerene you want everything to be in focus, at least as an exercise. Must have been a quiet morning. Nice colour change in the background. Pleasant placement of the spider. There may be a few dust spots visible. Like it.

Registered on November 2, 2015, 18 Posts, 192 Comments

Comment posted by Mark Seaver on November 17, 2016 at 4:46 PM

This is a great catch on this spider and it's dew covered web, Dennis. The dof is outstanding as a good stack should provide. Your comp. looks great and the details are awesome. Welcome to the world of macro stacking. It's challenging, frustrating, and rewarding all at the same time. I do see some stacking artifacts, in particular the oof colored highlights below the drops in the upper right. The issues of overlapped slices pops up routinely in high magnification shots. Once I exceed about 1/2 life size, it gets very challenging to manually adjust the focus

Registered on January 23, 2011, 1103 Posts, 17270 Comments

Comment posted by SandyRichardsBrown on November 17, 2016 at 5:14 PM

Looks great to me! The dew drops on thw web are very clear, and the spider in a good position, with a clean BG.
Excellent, especially if this is the first attempt with the new software. devil

Sandy

Registered on November 24, 2003, 3937 Posts, 12909 Comments

Comment posted by Jim Zablotny on November 17, 2016 at 6:21 PM

Hi Dennis,

That is a nice early Christmas present. I use Zerene Stacker at home and Helicon at work. Both can produce excellent final images. You did very well with this Argiope. There's a small amount of ghosting in the upper righthand corner and some light spots in the BG that can be cleaned up with the rubber stamp tool. I would also brighten this one up a bit to get those dew drops to sparkle more. Other than those suggestions--comp, subject, and BG look very nice. Well done with your first attempt at using this stacking software...........................Jim

Registered on January 17, 2004, 705 Posts, 3594 Comments

Comment posted by Bill Leggett on November 17, 2016 at 8:05 PM

This is pretty cool, Dennis. I've admired lots of Phil Hodgkins' work with stacking, guess I should try it too. Love all the extra "lenses" of all the dew devil

Registered on July 21, 2004, 706 Posts, 3233 Comments

Comment posted by scott lanz on November 17, 2016 at 9:14 PM

Outstanding result, Dennis. Love all the dew drops and the exceptionally nice bg. devil

Registered on November 14, 2003, 840 Posts, 12902 Comments

Comment posted by Balan Vinod on November 18, 2016 at 12:59 AM

Beautiful and Sharp Dennis. Love the little jewellery and sharp throughout. Nice work

Balan Vinod

Registered on March 20, 2006, 889 Posts, 2312 Comments

Comment posted by Swathiraj G on November 18, 2016 at 9:41 AM

This is a nice capture Dennis. Excellent dof and you got all dew drops well. Nice background too.

Registered on April 26, 2014, 71 Posts, 153 Comments

Comment posted by Yun Gao on November 20, 2016 at 11:28 PM

Excellent work, Dennis! Great composition and nice background. I like the yellow color in the spider and those dew drops. devil

Registered on September 11, 2012, 267 Posts, 1621 Comments

Comment posted by SandyRichardsBrown on December 17, 2016 at 10:21 PM

Love it! The fine detail and the dew drops are exceptional, as well as the interesting and colourful BG.
Cool!!
Sandy

Registered on November 24, 2003, 3937 Posts, 12909 Comments