Male Kestrel Portrait

[Loi Nguyen]

I have been shooting this Kestrel for a while. He lives and hunts in a small public garden and park, so the BG tends to be cluttered and the perches are man made. Last week, I found him on a natural perch, so I was happy to take this portrait. I darkened the BG a little bit to reduce distraction and took out a few branches.

!Dx
500f4 II
1/2500
f5.6
ISO-400
Evaluative Metering off the sky and opened by 1/3 EV.
Manual Mode
Tripod.

Cropped to about 30% of original W and 50% of original H. I purposed gave him some space and waited for the flight shot when he took off. He did eventually and the pose was incredible in a full frame, BUT he was too fast and the image was out of focus, so it ended up in the trash bin :(

Appreciate your comments

Thank you

Loi

[christopher galeski]

nice pose and BG,the bird is a bit contrasty on my screen,and I would take a bit off the top.thanks.

[Loi Nguyen]

Christopher, you are absolutely right. In an attempt to darken the BG, I made the bird too contrasty. Let me try another one. I also took your suggestion and taking a bit of the top. Let's see how it looks now. Thank you!

[Travis Reid]

The second version looks great..

[Marina Scarr]

Lovely capture and pose. I like the raised food. The details and colors look great in the RP.

[Karl Egressy]

Very nice image Loi. The repost is an improvement.

[Grace Scalzo]

Nicely done in the repost! A sweet subject with a nice pose. I do think that you are right on the edge with that big of a crop.

[vishaljadhav]

Nice Image, i like the way the bird is caught in a true raptor pose observing something, the repost bg works well, in the repost there appears to be some clone stamp resedue left just above the head, just appears so on my monitor, or its too late in the night that i am seeing it :S3:
I like the way the bird is

[Jonathan Ashton]

Loi the repost is better, I like the pose composition and background. Just one thing I would change, that is the largest branch under the bird - it has been cut off and the straight edge doesn't look too good. It never ceases to amaze me that these lightweight raptors really are so very lightweight, just look at the size of the perch he is on!!

[Loi Nguyen]

Dear All, I'm glad you like the RP. Thanks to Christopher who first pointed out my poor contrast. I will have to improve my PP a bit more on the clone stamp and healing brush. The BG is OK, but I'm sure under a more capable hand, it would look much better. Same with the big stick under the bird. This is a good image for me to practice on. Thanks a ton!