Owl Butterfly

Hi Barb,

You caught this butterfly in good light to capture those colors in the wings.  I think that a vertical crop with the eye-spot in the lower 3rd might work too.  Other than that good job on capturing this owl butterfly......................Jim

Barb, Excellent plane of focus and details in the wings. I also like the perch. I might consider darkening the OOF branches (?) in the background. Nice butterfly image!

Very nice, Barb. Good job with the comp - specifically ithe the plane of focus and positioning the BF against the clean part of the bg. I think darkening the URC might help the overall presentation, but very nice as is. 

The clarity of the bf is great, Barb, it really pops.  I'm guessing that you had to follow it around to get it this well positioned with nothing in the background overlapping.  It's balanced nicely against the sharp leaves on the left.  I too could see burning in the upper right corner to put a bit more attention on the bf.  That falls into the long established technique called "edge burning".

Lovely composition, and nice detail to show the colors and intricate patterns on the wings.  In the butterfly tent, do you have a lot of freedom to move around?  If so, it would be a great opportunity to get a shot with the wings open to catch it with the wings open, in that scary owl-imitation display.

Is the butterfly tent a local business in your area?  If so, it's a nice opportunity to find tropical species like this.
 

Thank you, everyone, for your comments and suggestions  

Wayne, what I referred to as the butterfly tent is an exhibit at the Chicago Botanic Garden.  It's a large screen tent with a path to walk on. There were not a lot of butterflies there last weekend because we've had a cold spring but usually during the summer there is a large variety of butterflies flying and landing on plants and even people.   You can walk anywhere you want on the path, with the butterflies flying and perching on plants very close to you.                                                                                    

I read that the owl butterfly is nonturnal and rests during the day so I don't know if I could get a wings open pose during the day when I'm there, but I've gotten some nice open wing poses of other types of butterflies. 

Thanks Barb.  Sounds like a great place, with lots of freedom for photography.  Glad I asked you about that, because exploring this subject turned out to be quite informative.

I had read that species in this genus were crepuscular, so photographing the wings open would be duffucult.  But after reading your answer, I did a quick Google image search and it looks like all the open-wing photos are of mounted specimens or captive ones where somebody is holding them with the wings open.  This leads me to guess that they don't actually display that owl-face position in nature!  I think the shot you got is the best representation of how they always perch, displaying only half of the owl face.  So all those photos that look like a whole owl face with the beak in the center are somewhat "faked" shots! 

Thanks for the information, Wayne.

Great light, color, natural framing and detail/DOF Barb, nice.

Beautiful specimen, well done!