The Lady Kestrel

[Shantanu Ambulgekar]

Hello All,

Please comment suggest. No background alteration made. Used Topaz for noise reduction. While taking this photo, I scrolled almost 15feet on my elbows and was able to take this just 5 feet away from the camera. This full frame photo.

canon 7d, Canon 100-400mm IS USM
f-stop - f/8
exposure time- 1/640 sec
ISO-320
exposure bias- +0.3 step
metering mode-spot
Flash used - no flash

[gail bisson]

Hi Shantana,
Good field work on getting so close to this beautiful bird.
A few suggestions come immediatetly to mind!
1. The feet are very close to the bottom of the frame so I would add more room down below if you have it and to keep the proportion the same I would remove a bit off the top. As this is a FF image, the lesson here is to frame the subject correctly in the field.
2.I would evict/clone out or crop out the stray grass on the LHS of the frame.
3. I would increase the brightness or exposure slightly.
4.The feather detail seems a bit crunchy so I would try decreasing the contrast and or sharpening of the bird.
5. I would clone out the black spot at the top of the grass that intersects with the bird.
A nice image that could be improved significantly with a few tweaks.
Gail

[Mike Landwehr]

Shantana, I do agree with all of Gail's suggestions. The heavy use of sharpening was the first thing that caught my eye. Having said that, I still like the image. You have a beautiful subject, with great eye contact, with a lovely background that complements the coloration of the bird very nicely.

[Shantanu Ambulgekar]

Thanks a lot Mike.

[Shantanu Ambulgekar]

Thanks a lot Gail for the valuable suggestions. I will try to implement those tonight and will post again.

Regards,
Shantanu

[Daniel Cadieux]

That was an amazing opportunity you had here, glad you were able to get so close! I imagine that from 5 feet away you were able to get so full-frame head portraits too!

For me the first thing is the subject being so close to the bottom edge of the frame...pointing the lens down a bit more would have made all the difference for the composition. I also agree with the other suggestions. I do love the background, habitat, and pose of the raptor.

[Shantanu Ambulgekar]

Thanks a lot Daniel. Next time, I will remember this suggestion..

[Shantanu Ambulgekar]

As suggested by you all, I have worked upon a little and did this.
Please comment.