Cattle Egrets with Red Blaze Sky

[Amy Marques]

This is a composite of two images. I was able to capture this amazing behavior between two cattle egrets in breeding plumage but the background and surrounding foliage was not attractive at the least bit. The sunset replacement sets them off nicely and lends the image a bit of a surreal look. Topaz Remask 5 was used to extract the birds and selected foliage.


Canon EF 600mm f/4L on 1DX, 1/500s, f/8, ISO 640

[Dennis Bishop]

Nicely done. Those parallel diagonals are very striking, and the colors of the legs, beaks, and eyes tie in nicely with the background. You and ReMask did a great job with the masking! Because blue-green is the complement of red-orange, I'd be tempted to make the vegetation a tad bluer, but I really like what you've created. Thanks for posting it here.

[Amy Marques]

That's a great point about the complimentary colors, Dennis. Thanks for that!

[Judy Howle]

Lovely composition and pose of the egrets! Nice cut out work and processing too.

[Nancy Bell]

Totally love the pose of the cattle egrets that you captured! I agree that your remasking/inserting the sunset is very well done. The red sunset is very bold and very dramatic...great choice for OOTB! Glad to have you here!

[Michael Gerald-Yamasaki]

Amy,

Greetings. Wow, that's a pretty spectacular image. I find myself wondering what is off image in the lower left and a little bit about whether the image would be better off without that lower left corner being quite so dramatic in color. The look of the egrets pulls the eye quite a bit by themselves. Spectacular image nonetheless. Thanks much for posting. Good show!

Cheers,

-Michael-

[gary ellwein]

Amy, I like how the colors of the egret's legs, beaks, eyes and reddish-brown feathers are reflected in the background. The strong composition has been noted by the others.

[Anita Bower]

I very much like how the beaks and legs pick up the color of the sky. Beautiful focus and details. The image is a bit dark. Have you considered brightening/lightening it up a bit? Glad you posted in this forum.