Glenn Pure
11-05-2017, 07:55 PM
172375
My favourite bird subjects are small birds, even though they present many challenges due to their shyness and speed. This is one such small bird not much bigger than a typical hummingbird (which we don't have over here). Even though this bird is some way up a tree, I managed a near eye-level shot by standing on a large earth bank not far from the tree. This bird and its partner were investigating a possible nest site in the earth bank on which I was standing (they sometimes excavate and build nests in earth tunnels although usually prefer tree hollows). Their cousins, the spotted pardalotes, prefer earth tunnels for nesting. Full sun at the time but bird in dappled light. I especially liked the bird's pose in this one although it may not be considered 'perfect'. Crop is about 30% of the frame area. I have darkened the background and cloned out an oof twig in the bottom left.
Technical: Canon 80D with EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM at 400mm handheld. Manual exposure 1/640 sec, f6.3, ISO 800. Processed in Canon DPP 4 (digital lens optimiser @ 50, sharpness = 3, crop, lighting adjustments, reduced NR from Canon default values) then exported 16 bit TIFF to Photoshop Elements with Neat Image NR plugin. Modest NR applied to bird and stronger to background. Sharpened in PSE (Sharpness tool, remove Gaussian Blur: usually 0.3 to 0.4 pixels at 50-60%) after final size reduction.
My favourite bird subjects are small birds, even though they present many challenges due to their shyness and speed. This is one such small bird not much bigger than a typical hummingbird (which we don't have over here). Even though this bird is some way up a tree, I managed a near eye-level shot by standing on a large earth bank not far from the tree. This bird and its partner were investigating a possible nest site in the earth bank on which I was standing (they sometimes excavate and build nests in earth tunnels although usually prefer tree hollows). Their cousins, the spotted pardalotes, prefer earth tunnels for nesting. Full sun at the time but bird in dappled light. I especially liked the bird's pose in this one although it may not be considered 'perfect'. Crop is about 30% of the frame area. I have darkened the background and cloned out an oof twig in the bottom left.
Technical: Canon 80D with EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM at 400mm handheld. Manual exposure 1/640 sec, f6.3, ISO 800. Processed in Canon DPP 4 (digital lens optimiser @ 50, sharpness = 3, crop, lighting adjustments, reduced NR from Canon default values) then exported 16 bit TIFF to Photoshop Elements with Neat Image NR plugin. Modest NR applied to bird and stronger to background. Sharpened in PSE (Sharpness tool, remove Gaussian Blur: usually 0.3 to 0.4 pixels at 50-60%) after final size reduction.