I found this Leaf Cutter Bee early in the morning and the dew was slowing its metabolism down. While photographing it the critter woke up, started to forage, and then did some pre-flight maintenance. Very common for an insect to clean itself before leaving a flower. The tricky part about this shot was getting all of the important bits in focus when the depth of field was only about .6mm thick and the critter was moving.
Tech Specs: Canon 80D (F11, 1/125, ISO 200) + a Canon MP-E 65mm macro lens (set to 2x) + a diffused MT-26EX RT (E-TTL metering). This is a single, uncropped, frame taken hand held. In post I used Topaz Denoise AI and Clarity in that order.
Leaf Cutter Maintenance by
John Kimbler, on Flickr
