American Kestrel - Male

[David Salem]

Caught this guy last winter at my local wildlife refuge. He flew around me in my truck a few times, then landed close by on these old palm fronds. I like the colors on this adult male.

1DMKIV---700mm---f6.3---ss1/2500---ISO640---HH@ 8:20am---25% crop

Thanks as always for looking and for your input. Appreciated

David

[Jim Thomas]

beautiful bird! Feather detail looks a bit soft and the oof stuff in loer right could be cleaned up.

Jim

[MohsenVahedipour]

Nice pose & perfect HA. Lovely colors, as you mentioned.

[Karl Egressy]

Nice head turn and excellent light, David.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Colours, head angle, background, exposure all look great. I agree the details look soft (well focused, just soft as posted).

[Mike Landwehr]

A really gorgeous image, David. The BG colors complement the subject. The side-lighting works well in this instance, with a very nice head angle. I like the perch, though the OOF material in the LR BG does detract a bit.

[Roman Kurywczak]

Possible tweaks covered.....fantastic pose and angle. Im OK with FG too.

[Grace Scalzo]

Great look at this beauty. Background is complementary. I think I'd prefer a bit more of a true vertical crop, and could see a bit trimmed from the left.

[Satish Ranadive]

Magnificent image of handsome bird, David.
I like the colors,pose,lights and nice details.

Regards,
Satish.

[David Salem]

Thanks for the comments everyone, appreciated.
When I looked at this last night I thought it looked good but some of the feathers look soft. As Daniel stated, its focused well just looks soft in spots. I think some of the feathers are soft looking in reality I re-posted with some more sharpening and I cropped as a vertical as suggested by Grace. I thought about a vert but due its tail position thought it would looked cramped up front. What do you think? Thanks in advance.

[dankearl]

I was going to mention the crop and now saw the repost.
Fixed it all, nice work on a very nice subject.

[Bill Dix]

Light and colors are simply beautiful. The repost addressed the sharpness issue for me. I might have been tempted to leave some or all of the OP room up front, and add a little canvas on top to make it more vertical.

[Diane Miller]

Beautiful capture! Wonderful to get so close to one of these guys! I always have trouble deciding how to crop an image with this composition. I guess it's often 50-50, but I do like the re-post.

I couldn't complain about sharpness here, but for my images, there is a Murphy's Law Corollary that says the eyes are never as sharp as they should be, even when details both in front and behind are sharp. Not saying I see that here, just commiserating about what can look like variable sharpness.

[Loi Nguyen]

David, a gorgeous looking bird in good light and BG. Not sure where your focus point was, but you must be very close to him, thus I wonder if DOF may be the reason for some softness in the feathers. But overall looks good me, the eye looks sharp and there is a catch light. The RP is a bit tight to me. Would love to see the full frame version. Loi

[Lyle Gruby]

Love the re-post. BG is just great.

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

I am with Bill here on the crop suggestion. the repost has too little room in the front of the bird, IMO.

Loved this shot...the eye level shooting angle, light and colors...terrific.

[gail bisson]

What a wonderful close-up shot.
Lovely light and head turn.
I would keep the OP and add more canvas up top. The repost is too tight for my taste,
gail

[David Salem]

Thanks everyone for the input and help. Greatly appreciated.
I compose this shot the way I did because of the pose he was in. I also thought the vertical was too tight in the front.
I like the idea of adding to the top though.
Loi, I think you're right, I was pretty darn close to this guy and only had a second or two to snap of a couple shots.
Due to being that close there is very little depth of field.
Thanks again.

[Karen Forderer]

Gorgeous photo of a beautiful bird. Love it.

[Stu Bowie]

Hi David, super pose and HA, and I do like the colours on him. Comp wise, Im not sure if you have any more space below, but I would still the vertical route, but not so tight on the left as in your repost, and add a bit to the bottom.

[Robert Holguin]

Terrific shot.
Great pose, wonderful background and light.
I personally like the OP best the repost is to tight for my liking.
Well done.

[David Salem]

Thanks everyone for the comments and suggestions, appreciated.