Gulf Fritillary

[randy]

Taken along Highway 11 near Cleveland, SC

Canon EOS 5D
Shutter speed: 1/800 sec
Aperture: F 5.6
Exposure mode: M
Exposure compensation: -1/3
Flash:no
Flash exposure compensation: no
Metering mode: Pattern
ISO: 100
Lens: Canon EF 100mm-400mm F4/5.6
Focal length:400 mm
AF mode: Manual Focus
Full Frame
Hand Held
Converted to jpg - No USM – I liked the soft look of this one.
Thanks for looking, comments, good, bad or indifferent, would be greatly appreciated.

[Photobiologist]

Randy -

Looks like a great shot for handheld. Composition looks well balanced, but wish there were a bit more of the lantana on the left similar to the right. I like it as is.

[wetbelly]

The butterfly looks great and I like the color combo. The lower half of the shot looks a little noisy, since you didn't use USM perhaps its just the ISO that was used - a little bit of a noise filter or just gaussian blur could fix it. Overall though, very nice shot. :)

[Casey]

This picture is different for sure. I love the grain. Wondering what if you had used a little flash to brighten it up.

[mrsisu]

A very nice image - I would love to get one like it.

[mark]

Very nice pose. I too agree on the use of a flash but I am concerned about the grain. Did you do this as artistic intent or was it chance? It is REALLY grainy!

[randy]

Thanks to all for the comments. The grain is due to the shot being hand held with no fill at a low ASA for the heavy, slow lens on a cloudy day, but it is an effect I have been playing with for a while, especially with flowers and butterflies. Actually, it all began by accident one day when I was shooting some flowers with the 100-400mm lens right after I purchased it. I saw an effect on my monitor while viewing the images that I thought looked "semi-impressionistic". I made it a point to learn how to reproduce the effect as I have sold a few images that were done that way. I know they are not the norm, but if someone wants to give me dollars for it, I will shoot it. By the way, if you take a look at some of my other images in my portfolio here, you will see that I do not do this often. I chose this image to put on the critique forum mostly because I thought it might have mixed reactions, which it did.

Happy Shooting!