Northern Cardinal

[Bill Dix]

One of my backyard birds, taken last September. Not sure about this one; let me know what you think.

D7200, 80-400 VR @ 350mm, ISO 2500, 1/2000@ f/7.1 manual.

[Isaac Grant]

Really nice pose and wing position. The head angle is great as well with great eye contact. But there is something off about the plumage. Parts seem too over saturated like the cheek and forehead while other parts seem like they are lacking fine feather details and are too dull like the back and wings. If you can work that out you will have a real winner here Bill. Background is very nice but you have some banding directly above the bird.

[stuart wanuck]

still a very nice image

[Bill Dix]

Thanks Isaac. You nicely enumerated my concerns. I've been looking carefully at my cardinals out the back window. Their backs and wings do have a less saturated, almost powdery look compared to the faces and breasts, especially when in the sunlight. In the repost I've addressed the oversaturation of the face, and eked out some more detail. Thanks for the observations.

[Satish Ranadive]

Gorgeous flight shot. Beautiful BG. Love it.
Regards,
Satish.

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[arash_hazeghi]

pose is super against that nice BG, the head isn't quite sharp to my eye, it looks like you did already try to sharpen it but still not quite there IMHO

TFS

[Bill Dix]

Thanks Arash. Here it is with some additional selective sharpening on the head. Maybe too much. This was a crop to 56% of the original width, so I doubt there is any more fine detail to be had. I also desaturated the reds in the head even more than the 1st repost. With the additional sharpening, and conversion to jpeg and sRGB, it seems to me that the reds still may be a little too strong in the head.

[Glenn Conlan]

Too much sharpening the previous post was better. A great shot with super wing position and head angle and the BG makes it pop. Well done

[Doug Brown]

Terrific pose and good eye contact. I don't think you had enough shutter speed to freeze this type of fast action, and your sharpness suffered as a result. I'd be going for 1/3200 or 1/4000.

[Geoffrey Montagu]

Simply a great flight pose, against a nice BG, Bill. Just a bit crunchy on the head. Prefer the 1st. repost.

Geoffrey




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