This is a poison dart frog (Dendrobates tinctorius 'Peacock') native to Brazil. It's about an inch and a half long, and to fill the frame with the tiny subject I added an extension tube between the 50mm macro lens and the camera body. This reduced depth of field, of course, and that's why I use f/32 for all the shots taken during my frog and reptile workshop. The light from the ring flash envelopes the frog such that there are very few shadows, and this means we can see and appreciate all of the remarkable detail. The frog is posing on a Bromeliad. The flowers I choose for the colorful environments have to be rigid enough to support the weight of the small subjects. I always focus on the eyes, but I do this in manual focus mode because the depth of field (as I view the frog through a wide open lens aperture) is so shallow that the critical focusing is done by moving the camera back and forth in tiny increments.
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