Pierre Williot
July 2025 - Male Ebony Jewelwing Damselfly
About the Image(s)
This single image was created at the Amherst State Park, Buffalo, NY at the end of June 2025. Here I used my hand-held OM-1 MII camera with a ON 150-400mm f/4.5 TC lens (1/1,000 sec, f/5.6, ISO 800 at 400 mm). Post-processing using ON1- Photo Raw: mild cropping, light adjustments, noise reduction, mild vignette (only global adjustments).
8 comments posted
Hi Pierre: Nice capture of this Damselfly.
Very nicely composed with the damselfly perched near the top of the curved blade of grass, then the long body of the fly is on a diagonal pointed upward, then the blue color on top of the long body adds an element of interest.
Do not want to sound like a "nit-pic" however the green background is a shade on the light side, if you want you could experiment with darkening it down a little. Am not at all certain how doing that would even work around the fine hairs on the legs, it may not look quite right.
Regarding sharpness; the fine hairs on the subject's legs is very sharply rendered.
The wing has a lot of fine lace detail that one can see closer to the body of the fly, if there was any way to lighten the top part of wing so showed more of that fine detail it would add a nice point of interest. Posted: 07/10/2025 04:27:50
Very nicely composed with the damselfly perched near the top of the curved blade of grass, then the long body of the fly is on a diagonal pointed upward, then the blue color on top of the long body adds an element of interest.
Do not want to sound like a "nit-pic" however the green background is a shade on the light side, if you want you could experiment with darkening it down a little. Am not at all certain how doing that would even work around the fine hairs on the legs, it may not look quite right.
Regarding sharpness; the fine hairs on the subject's legs is very sharply rendered.
The wing has a lot of fine lace detail that one can see closer to the body of the fly, if there was any way to lighten the top part of wing so showed more of that fine detail it would add a nice point of interest. Posted: 07/10/2025 04:27:50
Thanks Murphy. All very good points. Posted: 07/10/2025 11:47:17
This is a simple yet elegant image of this fly. The composition and pose of the subject is nicely seen and captured. The background is clean with no distractions, and the color is wonderful. I do agree that the background might be a bit bright and the subject a bit dark. Perhaps the camera was metering exposure on the background and not on the subject.
You have done an admirable job in displaying the details of the fly's legs, so I was a bit disappointed that much of the body was concealed in shadow. Here I suggest selecting the fly in post processing and bringing out more of the detail within the shadowed body. The shadows slider in ACR (or the equivalent tool in your processing software) is a very effective tool to accomplish this. The bowed leaf the fly is standing on appears a bit washed out as well, so I would darken and this and add back a bit of micro-contrast to this element. I have included a version of this image with these suggestions to illustrate my thoughts. Let me know what you think …
Posted: 07/10/2025 18:59:47
You have done an admirable job in displaying the details of the fly's legs, so I was a bit disappointed that much of the body was concealed in shadow. Here I suggest selecting the fly in post processing and bringing out more of the detail within the shadowed body. The shadows slider in ACR (or the equivalent tool in your processing software) is a very effective tool to accomplish this. The bowed leaf the fly is standing on appears a bit washed out as well, so I would darken and this and add back a bit of micro-contrast to this element. I have included a version of this image with these suggestions to illustrate my thoughts. Let me know what you think …
Posted: 07/10/2025 18:59:47
Hi Charles,
Thank you for your comments. I agree, the metering was more global than focussed on the wings. This is a Damselfly with Black Wings (Ebony Jewelwing Damselfly - male).
I like your version demonstrating more of the lacing in the wings. Posted: 07/14/2025 19:06:20
Thank you for your comments. I agree, the metering was more global than focussed on the wings. This is a Damselfly with Black Wings (Ebony Jewelwing Damselfly - male).
I like your version demonstrating more of the lacing in the wings. Posted: 07/14/2025 19:06:20
Pierre, I love the composition of the damselfly on the curved grass blade. The details on the legs of the damselfly sure stand out. Lightening the lacy wings adds to the image. Posted: 07/19/2025 22:13:02
Thanks Alane. Posted: 07/24/2025 18:23:06
Hi Pierre, a beautiful image, well done! You did a great job! For my personal taste, I like blurry background, so I made some adjustments. Thanks for sharing! Posted: 07/23/2025 14:00:09
Hi Xiao,
Thanks for the suggestion and demonstration. Posted: 07/24/2025 18:23:42
Thanks for the suggestion and demonstration. Posted: 07/24/2025 18:23:42