[[1ponders] (Paul)]

They were a bit sharp. The masking technique I'm using also seems to act as an unsharp layer mask. I've still got to work on it a bit.


Edit: I went back and redid the mask. I think that part of the problem is that your jpeg is only an 8 bit image and after I mask the original there is information lost that becomes obvious when I stretch it in level and curves. I've included your first tarantula image after gradient removal and the histograms as I processed the image.