Wow! Just happened to have a nice yellow background. Very nice.

That blurred background is gorgeous.

Sets off your focal subject very well and is serendipitously very complimentary on the colour front.


Caveats?

If I may be bold.. your image is of such good quality and integrity.. maybe a lil' sharpening is in order?

This is the method I usually employ..

"Selective Sharpening Using High Pass in Adobe Photoshop"

... save for the fact that I don't desaturate the layer used for the High Pass filter.

But, after reading the following in the above linked article..

"Desaturate the High Pass Layer

A disadvantage to sharpening with a high pass layer is the potential for increasing or adding noise to a photo. With other sharpening tools such as Unsharp Mask, you can control noise problems with adjustments to the different values set in the tool. With the high pass option, you control noise by doing three things:

Ensure your image capture is as clean as possible. This means using a tripod if not shooting at a high shutter speed, choosing the lowest ISO possible, and using the correct exposure.

Deal with any noise while processing your image. (If you're not confident about reducing noise in your image, check out our series "How to Use Noise Reduction for Silky Smooth Photography" and in particular, Marie Gardiner's article "How to Use the Reduce Noise Filter in Adobe Photoshop.")

Desaturate the high pass layer. Even when working on a colour image, the colour information in a high pass layer is irrelevant, so we're going to remove that information right from the top to ensure that extra information doesn't add noise."

... I think I just might start doing so.


This is a good good article from Cambridge in Color on what the various sharpening methods do and underscores some of the points made in the above article..

"Guide to Image Sharpening" - Cambridge in Colour


All the above is just me sharing some stuff, that you may not be aware of.. simply put.

That said..

Very nice shot, Chris. My fav out of your recent butterfly posts/uploads.

And.. of course, thanks for sharing this one with us.

I really like this one too - the butterfly against the yellow really works which is surprising to me - it has such nice backlighting.

Very beautiful!

Thank you, Les. im always open for more reading material. one can never know enough.(link saved) it is interesting! and yes, the butterfly could have used i little more sharpening, i do agree. i took it as far as i could without too much grain to my liking anyways. some might have felt different i supopose. you should have seen the original..lol!

others should really read this link provided above. ive used the techniques before in a round about way, they work! (unsharpen mask in Photoshop is one of my fav's, always sharpen as your last steps) (Adobe Lightroom provides a nice sharpen tool and grain reduction as well)(again, your last steps!)

ive always found this to hold true:

when it comes to sharpening, grain will always be introduced to some degree. then ask yourself, is it worth it?

when reducing grain, blur will be introduced...to some degree. again, asking yourself that same question.

it both has its advantages depending on the picture worked upon.

always ISO 100 with the lense i have, which in short i can say "JUNK" so... what the camera dont give me? smoother it in software i always say :)
I always think people hold too much faith in image stabilization or in Nikon VR tripods work better then your hands...little hard when your chasing a butterfly around, tricky little things.

Please, by all means. lets keep this discussion going. what are your thoughts on the subject of sharpening? lets all keep an open mind as well...you will be surprise what you might or might not know.

I like all three, and I did notice they were a bit soft.Les is not afraid to step in and give advice, I appreciate the time he takes to offer suggestions. Kudos Chris for a pretty darn good capture with the lens, and to Les for trying to offer some suggestions.
tigs=^..^=

Ok, hope you don't mind, Chris.. downloaded and only sharpened your image here using the High Pass Sharpening Method:

"Butterfly Effect III - High Pass Sharpened

... with the Radius setting kind of cranked to 6.5.

And note, in sharpening your image I did not desaturate the layer that the High Pass Sharpening was applied. Will leave that as an exercise for anyone interested to try and compare for themselves.

... ...

Do 'you' (speaking generally) detect that much more grain (or noise) compared to the original?

I am going to be bold and suggest.. 'no, not really'.

That's because the High Pass Sharpening technique, as alluded to the article linked to in my first comment.. is referred to as 'selective sharpening'. It tends towards working on the lines and edges of any image. Mitigating grain and/or noise overall.

This would be my list in descending order of preference/output/end results.. on the notes of the various sharpening methods:

1) High Pass Sharpening
2) Smart Sharpen
3) Unsharp Mask.

I would also suggest to have a read through the Cambridge in Color article as it provides a great overview of just what happens to your image's pixels with each sharpening method. Save that of the High Pass.

dont mind one bit Les, thank you! i got a few things to do and in a hurry right now, just want to acknowledge the appreciation. will come back and comment later.

Wow Wow Wow my dear friend, this is so Breath Taking and that bright beautiful background is perfect. Les makes wonderful suggestion and like it when he helps me out. Right into my favs

after looking at them side by side with dual monitors/taking the one that was uploaded to Caedes as my test subject of comparison.... lets be fair here :)

there is a little difference! however, without duals to look them over, you really dont see it. the quality of the pic isnt that good in the first place. it truly takes a side by side comparison in full view to see it...and i got my 2.0 readers on. not my usual 1.5's...eyes aint that bad yet :) its visiable without the readers...lets make that clear. nice job Les!

then i have to ask myself was it worth it? naah not really. for good reason though, continue reading please!

heres the real crime in derogation. the pic Les worked on and sharpened? that was only 61% of its true value taken, or size if you may. yet, he did get positive results. the fact i have to tear down that much to get within the 3200x3200 size frame? why worry about 10% improvement(maybe) that most wont see. if a pic is really horrible before down sizing? i dont even worry about even thinking of posting it. this one i like that somewhat orton effect to it. so felt a worthy post. now dont get me wrong, i would have loved to/selected just the butterfly/ sharpen just the subject. however, the quality just wasnt there for time spent.

since this is a most interesting topic. i wasnt to sure if i sharpen that photo or not? huummm sometimes i do and others i dont just due to the fact i know whats going to happen...Grain! and in my backgound, or sky if i had one in the shot. this background really made this shot stand out! it truly is a nice melt. I looked at the orig file and surprise...I did not sharpen at all. just for the reason the little bit i got were the same results Les got, maybe 10% before grain is introduced...so i probably left it be.

(again) now if you take a side by side and blow it up? interesting indeed. like i said i was fair enough to take the one Les did, with the one i uploaded 3163x2109. how is it you say...

Caveats? (i know that got a smile out of you Les)
when you're up to a level of zoom to a point it pixelates? i have nice smooth squares still, the copy using the sharpening techinque.(i downloaded from the link with rework) lots of pixel bruising around all the edges and within the insect. theres your trade off! and my proof to me i didnt sharpen this time. which did surprise me, im a sharpening fool!

in conclusion:
i think the data to our experiment needs a better subject, that is of better quality in shot to compare with. (so data incomplete!) yes you did squeeze i little more from my upload at first glance of comparing. so i truly believe the techinque works well, the key here? in moderation! like all things in life. you cant take without given up...well some would argue that last statement for sure.(no names mentioned)

so when we put this under the microscope? i dont like what i see. now thats not entirely because of technique, its due to file reduction/derogation of our test subject...which also occurs when cropping people. your taking away not just pixels but maga-pixels as well. zoom in, get closer, dont always rely on cropping. however,a different matter but related to our experiment here.

{we are an artist community, these types of discussion is why i signed up in the first place...theres not enough of them!}

Thank you for your time spent Les.

It`s a beauty. The sharpness or lack of it does not detract from this because it is soft and the colors take presence. Les makes a good point though as usual.

Blur or no blur...we always strive for that tack sharp image and do all we can to help them along. The thing I see here is a nicely matched background with central image. The colors are very nice. I like the outstretched wings for full view of a beautiful butterfly. The background is natural but not distracting. Thumbs up Chris. Makes a nice desktop background.