macro MACRO-9954

A fly on a grass/corn leaf, a shoot pointing up, one hard light coming from the front-top-right.

I like the lighting. The single light source gives natural shadows underneath the legs and well differentiates between the upper and undeside of the fly. Yet despite the hard light, no details are obschured by it. How much less depth would there have been in the photo if you had used a pair of flashes next to your lens, or worse, a ring flash. But the hard shadowing alse adds a dark bar in the very front on the corn leaf. If makes a strong contrast with the rest of the leaf, as if it's the shade of the camera. While it could be argued that this is a base line, I thin just a hint of it would have been enough, or even already too much.

The leaves are framing the insect, which is nice, as if you tried to get them onto the lines dictated by the Rule of Thirds, which doesn't work. If you insist on using that rule, place a pint of interest onto one of the cross-lines. Perhaps it was not intended at all, but then more awareness of the composition should prevent me from perceiving it thus.

I suggest that reframing would make both the composition more interesting and at the same time solve the dark bar in the foreground.

Personally, when I make pictures like this, I treat the insect the same as I do when portraiting humans. I wouldn't easily make a portrait of someone looking away and turning me the coat (unles it'd be a fashion photo, of course...). Where is the main point of interest, is it the wing, or is it the eye? Thet seem to be competing for attention. My impression is that the wing got the focus and the eye is behind, but I know insect eyes can be tricky in that respect. If you'd have turned the camera a bit more towards the face, there would have been no doubt about it.