I expect a lot of daylight landscapes and architecture on this Challenge, so I'm going for originality with an impossibly deep macro at night. ;-)
Taken with the kit lens at 41mm and a -2 exposure bias. Manual focus was set just beyond the grasshopper. Cropped, sharpened, converted to grayscale, then colorized slightly. Applied curves to even out the moon and cloned a bit around the moon's edge to make it sharper. Cloned out a few stray white specks and a faint blade of grass at the bottom right. Dodged the wings for more transparency. Added a border, then erased it over the grass stalks.
"Yeah, but how did you DO it?" OK- the moon is actually a photo I took two years ago through a telescope with a Canon Powershot G2. I simply projected it on my monitor to backlight the grasshopper for this shot. If I sharpened too much, the monitor pixels became apparent, so it's a little soft.
I refrigerated the grasshopper for several hours to slow him down, although he was still fairly active, and the antennae were constantly moving. The grass stalks were taped together and sandwiched between a long row of CDs to hold them upright about 5" in front of the monitor. There was more grass, and I was hoping to show the tops, but the weight of the grasshopper bent them over whenever he got close.
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Wow - now that's some work and serious thought you put into this photograph. Even if you used another photo as your background - still excellent work and original thinking - that's what this is about. :-)
Thanks for sharing the 'how you did it'. Inspires me to continue thinking outside the box....
I can't wait to see the 'how you did it' when the challenge is over. :-)
Great idea. I would love to be able to shoot the moon like you have. Cool shot!
This is incredible. The grasshopper(?) is in focus with its silhouette and the moon's craters are also well focused. Not the most appealing due to the color but from a technical aspect VERY impressive. 9
The cicada has landed! Great way to add interest to a normalliy static subject. The subject is almost too close to center. If possible, I'd recrop the moon, and shift either left or right. Awesome idea! 7
OK, there's another moon picture in this challenge and I think you two are mean for taking the poor moon from us earthlings :D This is awesome- great sillhouette.
This photo is probably already been put up for disqualification already. I'm really amazed with this and, at first sight, can't believe this can be done without cheating...The moon that big and in focus AND the very small animal in front in focus together...If it is genuine, I really think this should win! I voted a 10
Excellent! Some will think you used a photograph for the background image, but I know the technique uses rea limages because I used it myself. But yours is much better done than mine! 8
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