I was going through some shots I took at Butterfly World a while back when I came across this one. It’s of a Dryadula butterfly, also known as an Orange Heliconian. They range from Brazil to Mexico and rarely can be found as far north as Kansas.

When I took this I remember being excited that he was resting on some purple flowers. I try to find my butterflies  either on flowers whose colors complement their wings or  sitting in front of and attractive background.

In this case the background was rather dark. I added contrast in Nik Software’s Color Efex Pro followed by some warming with the Brilliance and Warmth filter in that program. I added a canvas rose texture I got from Joel Olives Photography, masked out some the texture off the butterfly’s wings, and did some selective sharpening with Nik Software’s sharpening software.