Cute! They look like little porcupines crossed with starfish! I like it a lot!

Considering the "thorny" source image, it's a good work and imaginative. In hi-res I can see edges I'm sure you can blend better

Nice work author

cool expressions

Pretty funny creatures.

freaking GREAT! lol

my fav.

Congrats! for 1st place.

congrats my friend

Congrats for your first place and a Happy New Year, Ernest!

congratulation =)

Congrats on 1st.. even though it may be a bit late.

Nice colors. Maybe I'd expect a bit of a distortion of the reflected thistle, because of the ripple effect. Good luck!

A little add on wazowski's comment: enlarge the ripple effect for more impact. Duplicate the layer with the ripple, Ctrl shift U to desaturate it, and add more contrast. Turn off the other layer, and save this as a psd file, different from your entry (it will be your displacement map).After that you can delete this layer. Select the reflection layer, go filters-Distort-Displace and choose the file you previously saved, Afterthat overlay or play with opacity. Do the same with the shadow. If it works it should look really cool, if not, check some tutorials for Displacement.

I ran out of space in the first comment.. Nice exploration path you took there, betting on the contrast. It's simple but it's probably the best from this contest.

To create the ripples i use the "zig zag" filter under the distort menu, and it uses contrast in colours to create a realistic ripple, however the water in this image is too plain, and so the only way for the ripples to actually show was to create many small ones, so unfortunatley the effect can;t be enlarged. I was also trying to create a displacement map for this image but even after desaturation and contrast adjustments the ripples weren't strong enough to create a good displacement map. Thank you very much for the suggestion as well as the positive second comment!

Nice color author

this looks fairly simple but nice end result,,,nice job

Congrats! for 2nd

congrats

Congrats for your second place and a Happy New Year, Matteo!

congrats Matteo!

Good thinking...foreground bee would be much larger, & the other bees would be around the same size...fix that & you've got a good entry.

Good idea, i think the honey or wax is a bit weak, you should try to find a picture showing real honeya nd try to copy the highlights and reflections, i would also think about removing the frame. Good luck.

Thank you for your comments, I made the changes and you both were righ, it looks much better now

Author, keep in mind that you can not use copyrighted pictures (source 1&3). See also here: http://www.pxleyes.com/blog/2009/06/how-and-where-to-find-legal-source-images/. Good luck!

Dear wazowski thank you for pointing it out, I changed my sources to none copyright without changing the concept

Congrats!

congrats

Congrats for yout third place and a Happy New Year, DigitalPro!

Great blend