Dead spider. Had a live spider, put him in the freezer for him to stop running around so much, ya know, to slow him down, left him in there to long. You can see the condensation on him.
Sigma 105 Macro, Lighting was Sigma 500 Super flash bounced off of homemade reflector.
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Place: 102 out of 200 Avg (all users): 5.5081 Avg (commenters): 7.0769 Avg (participants): 5.2368 Avg (non-participants): 5.7388 Views since voting: 911 Views during voting: 456 Votes: 248 Comments: 15 Favorites: 0
[I had just typed out my entire response before losing it due to my Internet connection being dropped - GRRRR] Let's see how much of it I recall...
First, I think that this is a really cool shot and meets the challenge description well. Second, I think that with the details about how you killed the spider, you might receive some "not so happy" comments from those viewers in the PETA camp. :-)
Composition:
I think that the centered/slightly off-center presentation actually works well here. I'm not sure that the white background does the subject justice however.
Focus/DOF:
Your focus is good, although not tack-sharp. I think the image would benefit from a litte sharper focus, but more importantly, a larger DOF. The shallow DOF actually detracts from the image's clarity and impact IMHO.
Color:
You've got some great tones in the spider herself, and I think you could capitalize on them even further by increasing the color sat and reducing the backlighting/increasing contrast. A little burning might not be a bad idea either.
Overall, I think that this is a very strong shot (and was a strong entry in the D&L challenge - I scored it an 8). Nice work.
I would have preferred to see better definition in the legs on the left side of the image; as it is the shallow DoF and light cause the dark legs and black body to merge together somewhat. This is one of the best executed shots that I've seen in the challenge so far. Hopefully the other voters won't penalize you too much for the subject.
Great colorful spider. The OOF leg in front of the body is distracting. If possible, I would have had the OOF leg be the one away from the body. Could a different composition have achieved that? I'm guessing you focused on the eyes and had the camera at the absolute minimum focal distance. That will naturally blur the foreground images and sometimes shortens the DOF. A small pullback from the minimum distance will give you a little extra DOF because you then get some foreground in focus rather than having it cut off immediately by the limitations of the lens. (Does that make sense at all? Am I just squawking?) Anyway, 7.
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