Want critique The sleeping emperor - Dragonfly UV

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EXIF
Sony A7iii, Loawa 100mm x2 F2.8 macro lens, ISO 1000, f/11, 1.6 second, tripod, 2 UV flashlights.

Chavezshutter

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Hello,

I have wanted to shoot this photo for quite some time. It is an Australian emperor dragonfly (Anax papuensis) under UV light. I have shown posts of this dragonfly before, it is the most common dragonflies I find near my home and occasionally I am lucky to find one sleeping and can get some very nice close ups. Under normal light they have a dull gold/bronze colour with black and yellow markings along its tail. One feature I really like about this species is the cat mask markings they have just before the tail

The original photo I took had so much glowing dust, fluff and even spiderwebs over the dragonflies wing that I considered not using the shot and wait for another attempt, I also tried using a rocket blower over the sleeping dragonfly's wings and the plant in the background with not much success , in the end I chose to clean up the photo with some photoshop, it took a lot longer than I wanted and ended up being the most time consuming part of the photo but I really wanted a UV dragonfly shot for a long time so I kept at it and managed to do a decent job with the cleanup. I also used some of the out of focus glowing bits to add bokeh light balls under the wings. I did manage to get shots where I was more squared with the wings but I chose this angle as it created more different textures in the wings, going from out of focus, soft lines to sharp cells/panels within the wings. I hope you like it....



As a comparison, here is the photo before the cleanup..

 

Lazarito305

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Feb 8, 2022
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Gorgeous man.
 
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Yohanna_D

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it's really unexpected to see such colours; was the dragonfly still alive? or was it already dead? (I am asking you this because you explained how you tried to clean the plant by using a device - so didn't that thing scare the dragonfly?)
Other than that, really awesome colours and photo!
 
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Chavezshutter

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Yes it was alive, once they are asleep it takes quite a lot to wake them up. So yes - I was trying to clean it while it was sleeping with a rocket blower, the plant has furry leaves and it had a bunch of glowing junk on it as well. Glad you like the photo
 
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