Tiny things

Fantastic use of composition here, with two dragonflies covered by the morning dew. Simplicity is often the best way to capture a scene and this is a great example of that. Soft green, yellow and brown hues fit perfectly to the colour of the dragonflies and the plant they are resting on. It's also interesting to see how these dragonflies are like a mirror image of each other. The photographer has used the depth of field skillfully to keep both of the subjects in the area of focus. The morning dew also gives a nice touch – so being awake in the early morning has certainly paid off here!

Sometimes the technical side is a big part of macro photography and this image of a Vietnam Beetle is a great example of that. There's no better way to get a highly detailed macro image with a certain depth of field and blurry background than by stacking a high number of photos. This image has been focus stacked from 84 images which allows us to see all those tiny details that we wouldn't normally see just with our own eyes. The smooth green background gives nice contrast to the brown and black-coloured insect.

This is a nicely seen and captured macro scene by the photographer. Everything from the composition to the colours are presented beautifully in this photo of liverleafs. What makes this to stand out from the rest of the photos is the "red line" that moves viewers' eyes from the flowers on the foreground to the circular booked with a silhouette of the flowers in the background. This is often challenging in macro photography but here it works very well. This image also shows nicely how the shallow depth of field can be used as a positive effect. Here it gives beautiful softness for the image.

Great image of a Daddy Longlegs resting on a leaf. I have found myself that the flash is seldom needed to get great macro photos when shooting at 1:1 magnifications, but here the photographer has used it nicely from the back of the subject. Light from the flash brings out the structure and green hues of the leaf and even lights up some of the details on the spider. The viewer's eye also wanders nicely through the cells of the leaf, ending up looking at the spider.

A very crisp macro photo of an Elephant Hawk Moth with very vibrant colours. Available space have been used really effectively in this image. As the photo is focus stacked from several images with different focus points, the moth is presented nicely by showing its amazing colours and details

There're also some nice little details like a couple of water drops on the bottom left and colorful flowers blurred in the top right background and combining with the colour of the moth.

Great photo of a great specimen.

Taking photos of flying insects is one of the most challenging things to get right in macro photography. This photo has a great idea but to be excellent it would need something more. The first thing that comes to mind is that the subjects are composed to the center of the frame. That's not always a bad thing but there are very few scenarios where this works. This image would be more dynamic if the subjects would have been composed using a golden ratio for example.

The second improvement would be the technical quality. This photo may be heavily cropped which would explain the noise and artifacts. It's hard to fill a full frame with such tiny insects but it would be required for getting a better quality photo.

Nevertheless this image has captured a great moment and it could be even greater with the improvements mentioned above.

Macro photos of water drops is one of the most photographed themes in the world but they will always catch your eye when done properly.

This image is a fine example of that. The square format works nicely with the drop composed using the golden ratio. Depth of the field is just the right and the flower inside the drop is a nice final touch for the image. I also like the bright pink colour tones that repeat through the whole image.

Seedlings are an interesting theme to shoot with a macro lens, as we can see from this photo. The central composition may not be the best decision for this image. The seedling would maybe be more in balance if they were composed a bit to the right or left of the image. The focus is also a bit too far back, with only a few strings sharp. I think it should be focused on the bottom of the seed, or maybe a focus stacking could have been a useful method here. I can also see some dust spots on the left side of the image that could have been removed in post processing.

In the end this image has a nice overall feel with beautiful colours, but with couple of adjustments it could be much more appealing.

Shooting underwater takes macro photography to another level. Here's a nice image of a really small shrimp sitting on a hard coral. Light can be somewhat limited when shooting underwater, which has been nicely solved by using two external strobes. Those strobes give a nice even light for the subject and its surroundings.

Depth of field is just right in this photo. The aperture has been small enough to get all the details of the subject in the area of focus, but still keeping the background blurry enough. The colours are also vivid and make the underwater world look really fresh.

An Owl Fly with a beautiful colour palette, photographed on a summer morning. A totally blurred background makes the subject pop out of the photo nicely. The colour of the background also works nicely with same tones found on the fly itself.

The central composition is also a great choice for the photo as the insect seems to be really symmetrical with its long antennae. What this proves is that a photo can be really simple and still impact the viewer greatly when the elements, colours and composition are spot on.

Insects are one of the most interesting subjects to take macro photos of. This photo has nice details in the eyes, but usually the viewer would like to see more of the subject in focus. This of course means a focus stacking which can be hard with moving subjects but with just a couple or more shots you can cover a wider area and then stack them in post-processing.

One of the things that I also noticed is the angle. These kinds of photos are much more effective when you take them from the eye level of the insect.

This photo has something that you don't see often in macro photos, and that is humour. One of the berries clearly has an open mouth and eyes, as if it were scared at the time this photo was taken! It's a fun photo for someone's own archive, but it could be much more with a couple of adjustments.

Firstly, we can see that the photo is obviously taken with too long an exposure time and that's why it has a bit of motion blur. It seems that the weather was a bit dull when taking this photo, so an external flash with a diffuser could have been useful here, too. I also think that the background is a bit bleak, so some kind of leaf or colored fabric would have added a slightly nicer colour to it.

Otherwise, this photo has a nice funny feeling and, and the composition works.

This is a great example of a macro photo where central composition works nicely. I think the whole subject should be in focus, so a smaller aperture would have been useful in this photo. It also seems that the dark areas in this photo are a bit too dark, so opening those a bit in post-processing or using a flash should have been considered. There's also a weird glow around the edges of the photo which may be intended but in my opinion it does not work here.

It's a beautiful image but with the adjustments mentioned above it could have been even more.