Swallowtail butterfly

Very nice subject on a nice flower.

Congrats

D&L

Hi Neven,

I definitely agree that those dis-lodged petals add a level of interest to this shot. Your subject looks nicely sharp and I find the overall colour palette quite pleasing. In a perfect world it would have been nice if the butterfly chose to do this on a flower with a cleaner background behind it, but I find them quite self-centered (they always seem to put THEIR needs ahead of those of the photographer!! ).

Cheers...thanks for sharing this...

Brad

Kinda cool indeed Neven! Very well seen and you did well composing this. I agree on the BG comment, but realize that is easier said than done. Your techs do make me wonder why you used MF and whether it was not possible to use a tripod to enable a lower ISO setting?

Given this is hand held, I think you did a real good job of controlling everything.

Thanks for the great comments everyone! I used manual focus because I couldn't hold focus well while the butterfly was constantly moving. As for the tripod, I was riding bike and didn't have it along. As to the background, I thought about blurring and darkening more in Photoshop but seemed more natural to post it this way.