EMU

[Terry Johnson]

136652

Hello, I believe this bird is an EMU. It was taken at Wildlife Safari in Southern, Oregon. An overcast day, the bird was about 6 feet away.

Nikon D7000
Nikon 18-200mm
Focal length 200mm
F-5.6
ISO-100
1/200

I would like to blur the background and tried to do so, however, If I try to blur the areas near the bird, then the bird starts to become blurred also. Any suggestions?

Thanks...Terry Johnson

[Doug West]

Do you use Photoshop?

If so, I always put my bird on one layer and the background on another layer. By doing
that I can play with the background as much as I want without affecting the bird.

Also, I would clone out that one blade of grass in the lower right hand corner.

Doug

[Enrique Patino]

in the thumbnail, it looks like it is poking its head out of the ground... interesting
it would have been better if the bird would have turned it head towards you a bit more. TFS

[Daniel Cadieux]

I like the composition and details. Exposure is spot on. Yes to a better head angle (looking more towards us).

As for the background, in my opinion no amount of blurring will make it look natural in this case. Blurring in post is best done subtly to look good but here you need lots of it. The main issue is that the subject was too close to the busy background so this has made it distracting by having it all mostly focus... Plus there are alot of fine feathers around the head that would make for a difficult and time-consuming making job to make it look good. Sometimes it is not easy or doable but it is preferable to position yourself in a way to put more distance between the subject and the background - sometimes just getting down way low achieves that (if possible), some other times it's choosing another angle or waiting for the subject to pick a better spot.

Hope this helps!

[Ashleigh Scully]

HI - if this bird is still there why don't you go back and try to photograph it again from a lower angle and maybe with the background grasses a little further away?

Everything else looks great. They are such pretty birds with lots of interesting feathers I would definitely try it again! Good luck!