Fly Portrait

Good DOF for this magnification. I agree that this is one ugly fellow. But I'm sure other flies think he's attractive.

The 50mm lens in the reverse position has let me get closer than

ever before. I put a +3 diopter in front of it to squeeze out every

bit of magnification.

very good

Sh-t. Pretty Scary. Nice depth of field and focus.

Eli, I find a rating of 2 for originality on an image like this to be insulting. I have taken hundred's (probably well over a thousand) shots to get one with this quality and magnification. I assume you find any picture of an insect to be less than "below average" originality? Unnecessarily low ratings like this are a sure way to irritate people.

Such a difficult shot.

Don't be too upset about the 2 rating. Don't take this the wrong way but it's not like you're the first guy to take a close up picture of a fly. Sadly you may not even be the first guy to do it by inverting his lens.

 

I would put more weight on the Aesthetics rating than the originality rating. It would actually be nice if they just did away with the whole originality rating. These days there really is not such thing as an original idea. I can pretty much guarantee that at some point throughout the history of Photography everything has been done at least once. So the Originality rating to me is useless which is why I give pretty much everyone an equal originality rating to their aesthetics rating.

 

Personally, I'm amazed that you've gotten this good quality from the inverted lens. I've tried doing macro that way and I never got good focus out of it. I guess I just never shot as much. Did you hand-hold the lens or did you rig up some sort of mounting for it?

 

Anyway, nice ugly shot you've got there ;-)

 

Take it easy. Bye for now.

the string of saliva in its mouth is perfect! was the fly alive when you took the picture? i've gone thru the rest of your folders, and this one seems to be missing that 'spark of life'. great macro work.

Looks like he's about to take off in flight. Great detail!

just perfect. i've been shooting flies off and on for years and they just never come out like this. focus is perfect, framing is fantastic, lighting is beautiful. great job!

 

I will have to make a macro coupler adapter to my Coolpix 5700 after looking your photos.

In a manner of speaking, that is. Great focus, dof, and magnification. Impressive shot.

Excellent macro.

 

 

Lovely shot, I have been photographing insects for years and I know how hard it is to geat a shot like this.

Great macro work.Congrats.Regards Pete.

Okay, this is the first "disturbing" image to me -- an already-admitted insectophobe. But it's a stunning image for what it is. All this work is superlative.

This and other some other insect closeups in your folders are amazing. I particularly like the one of the fly with the water bubble.

This is the first time I'm hearing of this "inverted" lens technique. How does it work? I can't even begin to imagine what you might mean by "inverting" a lens. A short explanation with further pointers (web or books etc) would be great. Thanks for sharing these wonderful images with us.

Chetan

i hope someday you will take a shot like this but focusing on the little beast's mouth instead of the eyes. i still regret the feet blocking the mouth from a full display of glory. a great masterpiece nonetheless. congrats.

Great depth of field, nice color, ugly creature!

Not greatly original, but to me, still good on that chapter, and really great in aesthetics. One of the 3 best in the folder.

Excellent

Stunning image-will they take over, one day ??

ugliness 7/7 along with other two

When it comes to critiquing by others, the evaluations given the images on the Yahoo!-Reuters news pages show that they're graded by people who judge the subject instead of technical and artistic skill. A pic can be at best mundane; but if they like the actress or rocker, the image gets higher ratings. I've seen what I thought were very good pics and the ratings are less than average. Fortunately, we don't have much of that on Photo.Net.

 

I almost agree with the above comment that there is little to gain from an originality rating. However, I expect many images may be original in the minds of the ones shooting them and they're unaware that similar work has been produced. I took what I thought was a very unique architectural image in downtown Houston, TX only to discover almost the same shot by an acclaimed, professional in a large, coffee table type volume in a library several years later. Mark's work may not be original. I'm just glad there is no rule that says if it's been done before, it cannot be done again.

 

I pulled the 50mm lens off my Canon and inverted it in front of my Mavica CD400. DOF was around zero and the stopped down aperture provided a small pentagonal opening. But whatever was in the focus plane was crisp.

 

What I wonder is how Mark managed to sneak up on so many insects...particularly the big-eyed ones. My experience is they zoom away ere the fly-swatter gets within 3 feet of them. Is it possible he had all this set up and waiting for so many tremendous compositions? He did say he's shot thousands of insect images. I believe him. *S*

 

Mark, thanks for such tremendous work. And thanks for revealing that those big eyes actually have a textured surface.

 

Sorry about writing a thesis.

I'd like to add that I too agree the originality rating is not so great. I think it has too many levels. If it had only three, where 98.9% of the photos received the middle rating, it might be better. The lowest could be saved for the redeye-filled party snaps of your best friend drunk and the highest could be saved for the really special photos. Most good photos get 5 or 6 for originality now anyways. Maybe three levels instead of seven would have the same problems.

 

To that I'd also like to add that for me, when I first saw this (back when it was posted), it was really original for me. Sure, I guess I assumed it could have been done before, especially considering the type of the equipment that's available when budget isn't a concern, but I'd personally never seen a fly picture like this. Not composed like this, not at this magnification. So to answer that guy's question about how can people give high originality ratings, that's how (I didn't rate it because I couldn't think of a good comment to go along with the 7/7 at the time...).