Lean on me - two common loon chicks back riding

[Randy Stout]

This family was imaged ~ two weeks ago. The chicks were two days old, and tired out from bobbing around on the lake. For the first 10 days or so they will seek the shelter of the parents back when tired out. After that, the parents evict them by diving away from them when they try to climb on board.

D500 500 f/4 AFS f/7.1 1/800s ISO500. Modest crop for comp.

This lake is difficult to launch my usual boat on, so these were shot from my NuCanoe, a broad beamed, sit on top kayak. My first outing with this rig in the kayak, and it went well. I don't have the same range of coverage because of the way the seat mounts, but still enough to be useful.

Advice and comments appreciated.

Cheers

Randy

[arash_hazeghi]

very nice Randy, love the ow angle and the chicks chilling out on mommy's back. If mine I'd bump the contrast a bit. TFS

[John Mack]

Very nice, like the green water and the chick resting its head on the other chick.

[Joseph Przybyla]

Lovely image, nice to see life continues in spite of all the challenges. As always your techs are pretty much spot on, exposure, detail and composition wonderful. The soft green background in a nice compliment to the color of the parent and chick. Thank you for sharing, Randy.

[Alex Becker]

Love the light detail and of course the youngster resting his head. Also really like that we can see each eye clearly and sharp. I would be very happy to have a shot like this. Quick question -- are you shooting with the 500 VR version or the AFS ii version? Thanks!

[John Whaley]

Wonderful image. I like the calm water and soft lighting. It looks tack sharp with fine details and high IQ. Do you use any type of waterproof bag on the kayak or just take your chances?

[Isaac Grant]

Fantastic interaction and love the position of those babies. I agree with Arash that the shot needs a little more contrast. I also think I would add a few points of black to the blacks in selective color. Would also reduce the greens and yellows on the bird as I see a cast coming off of the water. I would also crop differently. Would take some of the bottom and add that room to the top. Easy fixes for a shot I would love to have. This is my most wanted bird to photograph and had plans to get them this year that did not work out as they are not nesting this year on my friends lake where his boat is.

[Randy Stout]

Thanks everyone for your input. I did run white neutralizer on the original post, and the RGB values were within .2 of each other. I get the point about contrast. Its always a balance for me. The bird are often taken early in the morning, with some haze or fog in the air, so they look a bit low contrast. I tend to post them as I saw them.

The repost has a bit more contrast, ran white neutralizer again. I am happy with the crop, but appreciate the input.

I was using the AFS version of the 500mm. An old friend.

When heading out to the birds, the camera/lens is in a waterproof box.

Cheers

Randy

[Isaac Grant]

Hi Randy. For what it is worth, I have all but stopped using the White Neutralizer on my photos. Of course I do my best to import my whites as white as possible but this can't always be done for me in DPP cause I can't do selective work. I find that even at 25% opacity or less that I often get a blue or green cast when using it. And when I use it on a whole bird then it messes up the other colors. Often I will have more success with doing what seems like the opposite. I will select only the whites and in hue/saturation in PS I reduce whatever color is causing my whites to be off. Or I will go into selective color and decrease the blacks in the whites to brighten the whites. I think that leads to a much truer looking white. Anyway just thought that I would throw that out there. I do much of my shooting in direct morning and evening sun so often have whites that have a strong yellow or orange cast to them and this method works really well while keeping the rest of the colors true. When you use the white neutralizer do you do it to the whole bird or only the whites? Curious what your method is. Also what opacity you use?

[Randy Stout]

Issac:
Thanks for your info. I normally use 20-25% settings on the slider in White neutralizer, sometimes just the whites, sometimes the entire image.

I then will often lower the opacity of that layer to taste when back in Photoshop.

You are certainly right, that if used with a heavy hand, you get very unnatural, blue tinted images

Cheers

Randy

[arash_hazeghi]

love the report much better Randy!

[Glenn Conlan]

Nice improvement from the original with just a little tweek, very interesting. Wonderful capture