Princess !!!!!

[Alfred Forns]

Meet Princess !!!! One of my favorite birds and my favorite grackle !!! She nests close to Joe Overstreet Road next to a double wide As you can see she is expecting. Believe in human term is entering the month nine ..... and looks it !!! .... sorry I owe you a piece of tail :eek::):):)

Comments welcome and much appreciated

[Oscar Zangroniz]

Alfred, don't tell me you are getting like me in clipping tails now are you????
She is definitely a beautiful bird. Very sharp and a good head angle.
For my 2 cents worth; I like it.
Regards

[Harold Davis]

this smells like a test to me!!! al, as beautiful as princess is, she's got some issues. she's a little underexposed, her head angle isnt the greatest and she's missing part of her tail. i really dont like the branch intersecting her beak either. the light was coming from the back left leaving a big halo around her head. i dont mind it so much as it almost gives her an angelic look!!, but it did not help with exposing her tail feathers. as far as the compo, if she was looking directly at you it would be ok. as is, you need a little more canvas to the right to give her some room to look into. and that bg is kind of busy too. not quite sure what to think about it.

on the bright side, i love the catchlight in her eye and she is absolutely tack sharp!!!!!

[Nonda Surratt]

Harold gets up way to early;) Neat bird agree with Harold on most except I don't feel it is really under exposed, the stick though her beak bugs me the most I think.

[Gus Cobos]

Love the pleasing colors of the background Al...NOW NOW... you are testing us are you? I'm not going to say anything about the tail, and I'm not going to mention anything about adding just a wee bit of canvas to the left of the frame. I was just contemplating these ideas in my head...OH...:D I forgot... yes the bird is tack sharp , good eye contact and details in the feathers... Congrats...:D

[Harold Davis]

ok, i might add that your dof is great and it would help if you added your exif data so we could help you out:p:p:p:D:D:D

[Gail Spitler]

Hi Al and everyone
Okay, as a test, let me suggest an alternative viewpoint.
First as an aside -I am pretty sure that this bird isn't the princess, but one of her offspring. Note the dark eye, means it's not an adult, I think.
There is something about the quality of this image that I really like; the image of the bird is not the typical image of the grackle that we always see. I love the disheveled feathers that have a softness but are tack sharp in the image. I look at this bird as a disheveled teenager, just out of bed.
I agree that having guidelines can help us create better quality images, more consistently; but perhaps they don't override all other considerations.
So my bottom line on this image is that there is something about it that really attracts me to it, perhaps there is a whimsy to the image. I want the whimsy plus a shift in the position of the photographer so we can see the whole tail.
Just a few thoughts as I try to work through my own position.
Cheers
Gail Spitler
British Columbia, Canada

[Alfred Forns]

.... you people are sharp I thought that by posting a pregnant young grackle most faults would be totally overlooked !!!! Not the case !!!

The part that bothers me the most is the bg Actually did not do all that much work buts has an un-natural look The bird does look pleasing .... and she was hanging around a double wide !!!