Theme - Oystercatcher

[William Dickson]

Canon 1DX
f/4 500mm with 1.4
f/6.3
1/2500
ISO 1600

This is one from Sunday, late afternoon winter sun, when I went to photograph the seals on the shore, in my hometown. I was set up, with my new tripod and gimbal head, watching the seals, when this guy, flew in real close, and perched nearby. The BG, apart from the sea, is another set of rocks, some distance away, which I thought gave this one, some depth. No feet shown, but I do like the seaweed blending into the FG. Must say, the tripod sure makes a difference from HH.

Will

[John Mack]

The seaweed is cool, nice light here.

[Abhijit Deshpande]

Wonderful image. TFS
Was Noise reduction applied to the BG?

[Kirk Benson]

I really like the habitat of this portrait Will, the seaweed is a cool element and I don't mind not being able to see the feet. Wonderful detail and color, and the head is turned just enough to catch the sunlight nicely. Well done. :-)
Only nits are that the whites might be a tad hot in a couple of spots, and the BG looks a bit odd/pixelated for some reason.

[William Dickson]

Thanks guys. No NR on the BG. but I did play around with the highlights and contrast, and unfortunately posterization has occurred.

Will

[Bob Smith]

I like the way the shadow and light interplays in this image Will and the crinkly seaweed and barnacled rock provides a fine setting.

[Arthur Morris]

Sharp with a nice image design. The reason some of the WHITEs are on the bright side is the off-angled light that has left the most of the bird in shade.

Is the white neck band normal? I have seen Eurasian Oystercatcher and do not remember that feature ...

with love, artie

[William Dickson]

Thank you, Bob and Artie. Hi Artie, I never even thought about the white band, but yes, I think your right. What type is this then?

Will

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Will, I might be tempted to revisit the RAW and pull the Highlights & Contrast back to zero. Being side on has helped and I don't mind the missing feet. Good detail, but if this is cropped then I might be tempted to zoom out a fraction so it's a tad less in the frame (smaller). You were lucky not to intersect the head/beak with the horizon, well done on that. With regard to the whites, yes they are a tad bright, again did you tweak the white point in Levels, if so again I would peg it back, in doing so you may get some more tone back? Personally I'm not a lover of the saturated blue coming through in the seaweed, I would mask it and reduce.

Hope you are enjoying the new tripod & head.

TFS
Steve

[Arthur Morris]

Thank you, Bob and Artie. Hi Artie, I never even thought about the white band, but yes, I think your right. What type is this then?

Will

YAW Will. There is only one type in the UK. It does not look like a juvie; perhaps it is an aberrant bird. Stuff like that can sometimes be related to diet ...

with love, artie

[William Dickson]

Thanks for that Steve. I do have more canvas. I'll have a look at that, and your other pointers.

Will

[William Dickson]

YAW Will. There is only one type in the UK. It does not look like a juvie; perhaps it is an aberrant bird. Stuff like that can sometimes be related to diet ...

with love, artie

I've posted it to a friend of mine, I'll let you know what he comes up with

Will

[Glenn Pure]

Pretty nice shot, Will. In my experience, these are hard birds to photograph in direct light due to the extremes of contrast. You've done a pretty good job on the tones I think with a few pointers offered to fix the minor issues here. Shame about the posterisation on the water but not a killer by any stretch. I like the composition and size of the bird in this image. Details is superb and I like the seaweed too. I can see the blue cast on the breast and seaweed. I think it's probably worth trying to remove some but not all of that as our vision automatically adjusts to some degree to remove that when we are looking at a live scene but a photograph will show reality as it does here. I'd be pretty happy if this was mine.

[William Dickson]

Thanks for that Glenn

Will

[William Dickson]

YAW Will. There is only one type in the UK. It does not look like a juvie; perhaps it is an aberrant bird. Stuff like that can sometimes be related to diet ...

with love, artie

Apparently it will be a juve, and this occurs sometimes.!!!

[keith mitchell]

Will it could be a first summer bird , adult winter depending on the time of the year when the shot was taken.

Cheers Keith.