theme: Delaware shorebird migration

[Nancy Bell]

I photographed this during the spring migration at the time the horseshoe crabs lay their eggs on the beaches. It was a totally amazing spectacle of crabs and shorebirds!

To my original blurred image I used topaz simplify 4 oil paint b&w. It was a gray day and the bkgd ocean was a dull slate gray, so I felt b&w was more interesting. Plus I did not want the lines from the waves and simplify removed most of them. I did some additional clean-up. I added a layer a nik silver efex, cool tones, that added the pale blue and those few steaks for a bit of a horizontal frame.

[Michael Gerald-Yamasaki]

Nancy,

Greetings. I like the little feet and the, well, simplified forms capturing the blur in a minimal way. A little bit more water pattern (if subdued) would add some depth, I think. I'm not wild about the top line. Thanks for posting.

Cheers,

-Michael-

[Anita Bower]

The B&W with pale blue work nicely here. Nice job with simplifying. I'd crop from the top to eliminate line and top two birds, which would focus attention on the bulk of the birds. I'd clone out the line at the bottom. I find the lines distracting.

[Randall Farhy]

Love the conversion and face paced feeling, but I too find the upper and lower lines distracting, especially the merger on the lower right. Perhaps keep a lower line free of mergers to ground the frame, but really I think the erratic lines created by the birds in flight are strong enough to define the space. Another fantastic image!

[Nancy Bell]

Thanks all! I was on the fence about those framing lines. I had erased the vertical ones and couldn't decide about the horizontal ones. But the vote is in and I'll just get rid of those also.

[Kerry Perkins]

This is quite interesting and I love your technique. It reminds me of a wet brush ink painting on rough paper, very cool. I'm thinking the lines need to go too, as they don't really add to the image. Maybe if the bottom one looked like water then only the top one would need to go, but without any establishing details the bottom one just intrudes. Well done.