CCC Forum

Im currently submitting entries for the Amateur Photographer of the Year (APOY) http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/ap ... -year-2015. This is the first time Ive entered a national competition requiring multiple entries so Im using it as an incentive to take more images and hopefully improve my photography.

The theme this month is Macro and Ive spent the last few days solely in my garden trying to capture the Macro world. All images below were shot in my crop sensor Canon 60D with a Sigma 100mm Macro. All comments welcome and would appreciate what you think is the strongest image so far. Thanks!

The flying insects look good and from what I can see look reasonably focused. The ant does appear a little soft and the spiders might well do with a bit of focus stacking.

However, all the subjects are a little small within the image. A little cropping might help.

Otherwise a very good effort.

IMG 9130 is by far the strongest for me, though not without a few flaws. It combines macro with some very artistic rendering of the dew & cobweb and makes the others look quite ordinary by comparison.

There are one or two unfortunately placed dewdrops obscuring the spider and it could be a touch sharper but it's probably rescuable in photoshop

Interesting to see, macro isn't someone that's often posted here!

What do you think of the sigma macro lens?

Decided more detailed feedback was only fair


A much tighter crop of the ant would help bring out the detail and reinforce it's the ant - not the stalk - that we should be looking at. Composition is fine and the background is lovely and clean.


Doesn't feel like you have nailed focus here and it suffers from "animal backside" syndrome (something I personally excel at too ). The bokeh around the edges is lovely but it impinges too much on the main subject for it to work.


Best by far in my opinion, if only there was a clear view of the spider's "face"

Again needs cropping onto the fly to make the focus point unmistakeable. The green leaf in the background is quite a strong, angular shape and is distracting but easily cloned out. Including the plant it's on is often a good idea too - this is different in style to the bokeh-loveliness of the spider but is more of a record shot.


Background is super busy and overlaps with the subject. In the fly above it's busy but doesn't overlap so easier to ignore/remove. Here it'd be more time-consuming to fix it.


Nice effect as it's clearly human skin it has landed on. Quite good, but I do sort of wish it was somehow feeding on you

Overall, bokeh spider is the strongest for me still.

Thanks for all comments and David C's image by image critique.

I agree that 9130 is the strongest. Colour wasnt tweaked that much either. Its the old trick of using a water spray on a cobweb. Surprisingly I had to use ISO 800 @ F11 1/250s in bright sunshine and added a reflector and still alot of shots were blurred. However, I was using the Sigma at its maximum 1:1 and all of these bugs were no more than 4mm in size so its insanely tricky on focusing Apart from the ant shot all were handheld.

The ant shot probably took longest to setup. I saw them coming up a strawberry stem to feed on flies so setup camera on tripod and had it parallel for best focus. However, they were too fast so had to use off camera flash to freeze their movement. That took ALOT of experimentation, holding it at different angles and different powers. I later had a great water drop under another stem but they wouldnt perform for me, I even managed to drop a few of them nearby and they walked away

Well the spiders are still there (on an allium head) so I may retry and hope to avoid backside syndrome

David C - Ive had the Sigma for years and bought it second hand and find it fantastic. Robustly made, easy to focus and its got good glass. I still remember the first time I used it and saw the world very differently.

I almost forgot that I took another shot I really liked. This one probably tells more of a story than the others. FYI I went back the following day and it had gone, circle of life!

That's a much better shot than the original six. It's much more in focus (especially where it matters) and, as you say, has a story.

But I still think it would benefit from a crop and perhaps toning down the whitish background.

Hi Paul,

I agree that this new one is the best of the group. With the crop you re-orient the spider to be on top? The bokeh is very good and not there's much to indicate the actual position gravity-wise.

Best wishes with the entry,

Graham