Northern Pintail: High and Dry

[Bill Dix]

I wasn't sure if this could be salvaged, but I liked the pose and decided to play with it. NR on the BG, evicted a Gadwall and some flotsam, brushed the water with a 20% opacity brush to smooth out the distracting ripples; Levels adjustment and Topaz Detail @2% on the duck, USM. Cropped to about 50% of full width. C&C always appreciated. [PS. looking at the preview, I may have oversharpened to the point of a little crunchiness, and might need to go back and redo. What do you think?]

D7000, 500f4 + 1.4 TC, ISO 1000, 1/2500s @ f/6.3 manual. Lowered Gitzo an Mongoose, QuikCamo.

[William Dickson]

Glad you kept it Bill and for sharing. The pose is nice and I like the POV. I see the sharpness as ok. The only wee niggle I have is the yellow coloured rock, but I like the image

[Bill Dix]

Glad you kept it Bill and for sharing. The pose is nice and I like the POV. I see the sharpness as ok. The only wee niggle I have is the yellow coloured rock, but I like the image

Thanks William. That's actually some sort of tubular water plant that graces our marshes. Someone on the forum will probably know the name of it. I suppose I might desaturate it a bit.

[Geoffrey Montagu]

Also glad you kept and salvaged this image, Bill. The preening pose is wonderful. The sharpness looks fine to me. Personally I might like to see a version without what I think is a chunk of Bullhead Water Lily stem in front of perch.




Geoffrey

[Bill Dix]

Thanks Geoffrey. I knew someone would know the name of that plant. It's a tricky job to clone it out because of the reflections, but I might give it a try.

[Moe Ali]

The pose and detail look great to my eyes. The pintail has always been my most elusive duck, I would be proud of this shot.

I took the liberty of removing the yellow stem in photoshop to see if it made a difference on the image. I agree with the others, it does look even better without that stem.

[Marina Scarr]

Lovely light, pose and environment, Bill. I would crop some off of the bottom and go for more of a pano look. I think it makes the image quite a bit stronger.

[Enrique Patino]

Strong image, but there is something funky going on with the perch and other elements protruding out of the water. some artifacts that look blue/purple?? ;)

[arash_hazeghi]

I love the soft light and the calm water, sharpness looks good to me. the perch looks natural to my eye, but it could be a nicer perch. I might clone out the yellow stuff in the FG

TFS

[gail bisson]

A wonderful shot of my nemesis duck.Lovely light and pose and the PP looks excellent.
I kind of like the yellow vegetation but am wondering about the purple on top of the rocks?
I would personally back off a tiny little bit on the sharpening.
Gail

[Bill Dix]

Thanks everyone for your comments and helpful suggestions.

Here's a version without the water lily stem. Looking at the frames just prior to this one, it seems that the stem floated into view just when he did the preening pose. So I could use the prior frames as a guide to cloning out the stem. I think this is a pretty good replication.

I don't understand the blue on the "rocks" (actually another lily stem and a mud blob, I think). That color shows in the RAW file. But I've desaturated the blue channel in that area to remove the distraction.

And I've cropped to a 9:16 pano.

Hope you like it.

[Satish Ranadive]

Excellent image, Bill Sir.
Wonderful color pallet. Very nice preening pose with great superfine details. Love the RP without lily and panorama composition.

Regards,
Satish.

[Grace Scalzo]

Bill, Excellent subject, unique perch and complimentary color in the water. I am suggesting this as an additional composition option. To my eye, all the space on the left as viewed isn't adding anything. My eye travels a circle from the bird's beautifully arched neck, to the perch and back around. So if this was mine, and the crop help up, I would come in much tighter from the left. I wouldn't want to tempt the viewer to explore that left hand side, but want to keep him focused right on the bird. My 2 cents (and the reason behind the suggestion). :)

[Bill Dix]

Hi Grace. I agree. The problem of the negative space is exacerbated by the pano crop (and partly for that reason, I actually prefer the OP). This is already a rather large crop: 50% of original width, 25% of original pixel count. So I don't know if the IQ would hold up, but I could give it a try. Having almost half of the frame as a not-too-pleasing empty brown void is not a recipe for a great image. Thanks for looking and for your always-valued opinion.

[Bob Smith]

An artistic pose Bill from a frog's eye vantage point--nice emphasis of the curve of the neck by the white head pinstripe--and I like the golden diamond pattern of the floating seed cone in the foreground. I'm not sure I see over sharpening but w/b interested to see the result of reducing it a bit.

[David Salem]

Very nice Bill. One of my favorite ducks in a very artistic pose and setting. I like the original with maybe a bit off of the left. TFS