African Jacana

[hennieloots]

I took this image during a visit to the Kruger National Park, SA. The Jacana was wading in a shallow stream running across the road near Mpondo dam. I have a few from this series I would still like to add; this was my favorite thus far - I like the water droplets, the HA and the color.

Techs: Canon 1D-X | Canon EF 600mm F4 IS USM Mii– 1/1250 @ F/7.1 & ISO: 1000 |EB: 0 | On beanbag from SUV |
PP:
Crop – 60%
LR – Contrast added, recovered minimal shadows, sharpened
PS6 – Luminosity mask – Highlights reduced by LBM, Midtone contrast added with LBM, Selective sharpening, Selective NR to BG, Selective dodge & burn to mainly head, eye and beak of subject, Dodge to lighten droplets.

All comments and critique always welcome and appreciated!
Regards
Hennie

[Randy Stout]

Hennie:

Good looking shooting angle despite shooting from car, long focal length helped.

I like the attentive pose, sense of action from the drops.

I think it needs a sliver of CCW rotation. Always difficult to tell for sure in this type of image, but based on the reflection and a few of the ripples, that is my sense.

Cheers

Randy

[Daniel Cadieux]

My initial reaction was that the image needed some rotation too. Neat water drop flying action, I guess this fella had just attempted a catch. Beautiful colours and an interesting comp. A bit of noise in the blacks, especially the lores...did you need to recover some shadows there?

[Satish Ranadive]

Beautiful image.I like the pose,colors, water droplets and placement of the jacana.

Regards,
Satish.