Skimmer Flock

[David Hollander]

Hello everyone. This is my first post on Bird Photographers.Net. I took this picture of Skimmers on July 19, 2017, at Nickerson Beach, in Long Island NY, probably about 9 am. The camera was supported on a monopod. I had been shooting chicks close up at f8.0 when this flock took off, and I didn't have the presence of mind to change the aperture. This picture is heavily cropped, and some background elements were removed. I'm trying some new (to me) photo processing techniques, so I would especially appreciate critiques on that. Thanks for viewing.

Canon 5D IV
Canon 100-400L IS II + 1.4x TC
ISO 800
560mm
F 8.0
1/2000

[Isaac Grant]

Welcome David. I have seen this same scene 1,000 times at Nickerson and each time I enjoy it more. I love when all of the birds pick up and swirl around. I don't normally take these kinds of shots so can't speak too much to the composition. As far as the color and exposure goes I find the image a bit thin and dark. I don't see the kind of contrast that I would expect between the black and white birds, the sky and the grass. Also don't see the rich colors I would expect in the green grass and blue sky. Not sure what new techniques you were using or what you did here so it is hard to comment on exactly what to change. Perhaps you can tell us? I did a quick re work and did the following.

Brightness +15
Contrast +7
Saturation +3
Selected birds and grass and applied detail extractor and tonal contrast mask at 25% opacity
inversed selection and applied a 75% opacity white neutralizer layer to sky only
Did a highlight and shadow adjustment.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Hey David, welcome to BPN! I like the scene a lot. F/8 looks fine so no worries there in this case. I love the sharp strip of grass along the bottom. Crop-wise I would give a bit more left and right: reason being is that on the left the top bird's bill is touching the frame's edge, and on the right the top birds tail is also touching the edge. Small details to watch out for with image of flocks. I kinda wish the flock was angling as touch more towards you, but I love what you were going for here.

Hope to see more from you - images and comments as well!

[David Hollander]

Guys,

Thanks very much for taking the time to provide comments. I found them very helpful. For background, I've attached a jpeg of the original unprocessed file. I converted this in Canon DPP 4. I applied DLO, noise reduction (but not sharpening), adjusted the gamma, reduced the highlights -2, and boosted the shadows +2, in each case to bring out detail. That probably contributed to the loss of contrast between the black and the white birds that Isaac noted. The "flatness" is probably a function of the compression of apparent depth of field due to the distance between myself and the subject. I then processed the TIFF file in PSE 15, with the first step being the removal of some background elements and OOF birds. I then selected the flock and the grass and applied a modest amount of noise reduction with Neat Image 8.2 and a stronger amount to the background. My final step at this point would normally be to apply NIK detail extractor/tonal contrast to the subject, but I didn't like the results I got. Instead I applied NIK output sharpener, which to my eye did a better job of enhancing details in the black parts of the wings. This process is new to me because my customary work flow would be to use Lightroom for RAW conversion and basic exposure compensation. I would then transfer the picture into PSE and use NIK dfine for noise reduction and detail extractor/tonal contrast on the subject, but using the NIK control points instead of PSE selections to control the application of those effects. I will take your comments into account and try processing another version of this picture.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Wow, you got a great canvas to work on! I actually think you cropped too tightly as the flock looks good. I also love the terns. In the repost I cropped wider but kept a pano format, and left the sharpest terns in. What do you think?