There was a rubber frog, I think it might have been a dog toy, that ended up in a local stream. Tucked away in the undergrowth and having weathered a bit I was very close to posting it
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The nice thing about those duck decoys and rubber frogs is that they pose patiently for you while you focus your camera.
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You just made me think of this observation: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/179142725
Honestly pretty funny
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Most of my observations before mid July 2023 are pretty abysmal from using a cheap little camera bought from amazon but I still keep them since I have some scarce and under recorded species as well as quite a few RG observations photographed. Deleted most of my captive obs tho.
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I even was thinking “wow this big guy doesn’t even care, the smaller ones would have been long gone”. Then I looked at the zoomed in picture
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Since the year’s coming to a close and I still find this thread hilarious I thought I’d have a look at this year’s observations. So, behold, the European peacock butterfly:
This just happened to be on a butterfly bush on a demolition site / flytipping site, as they often are here. I didn’t even realise it was there until I was looking at the photo on a big monitor at home… but with that red hue and bright white eyespot, it’s still recognisable - all 14647 pixels of it (which isn’t much considering my usual point and shoot has 12 million!).
The butterfly is visible on the plant’s observation and I found it funny that it was still recognisable at such a tiny size (and it’s a species I really don’t get to observe enough, despite it being a very common species)… so it’s lucky enough to get it’s own observation.
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I’ve noticed that peacocks have been fairly scarce in the UK this year ( even more so for small tortoishells where I probably saw about 30-50 in the entirety of 2023). Can’t say the same for red admirals tho since even now i’m still seeing a couple and during their peak time (particularly when I was staying in Cornwall with a huge Buddleia in the patio garden) there were thousands.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/190736139
This one i captured on Sunday…
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Just for fun, I ran your shot through Topaz Gigapixel to see what its algorithms would spit out. This is 2X mag.
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It’s the ol’ closer-you-get the lower-the-DOF trap. It’s just a slice of focus you get to play with macro after a certain magnification. And you can see that in this pic.
The ‘classic’ camera solution is more-light/smaller-aperture – which is tricky or not even an option for most phones. And for non-phone cameras, it usually means lugging a decent flash/diffuser setup with you.
Or, if you’re lucky to have this camera (or dekstop) option, shoot for focus stacking.
Which can also be achieved after shooting by capturing things in a high rez video clip. That’s how I often shoot. I use video mode and gently rock a bit to get a ‘focus scan’ of the subject and then take out decent frames from the video to stack at software back home. It’s not as tricky as it sounds, really. And the great thing is that video tends to pick up more detail in lower light.
Lastly, there are blur-reduction packages that can recover ‘some’ detail from a badly blurred image. I ran your image through the software I use (Topaz suite) and got this:
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Can’t beat physics, unfortunately.
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I don’t know if these are the worst, but they are among the worst. (there are so many) I do the best I can.
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This has to be my worst submitted to iNat – and necessarily so, due to the inability to get any closer – but it made RG based on location alone.
Devil’s Hole Pupfish:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/195844162
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Also this guy: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/66974345
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I keep forgetting just how small they really are. Nature documentary photography can really mess with a person’s sense of scale.
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Probably this one https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/170034539 or this https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/187563503 especially the second photo
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I hear you about the autofocus issues. 
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