Reddish Egret in flight

[Randy Rimland]

D850 + 300pf + 1.4TC
this combo is quite a treat to shoot. Even with the grip on, this combo is ridiculously small and light.
F/5.6, 1/1250, iso200

173936

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

Unfortunately, for my taste this is much too tight a crop. Not sure why you have decided to present it this way?

You should have at least three or more stops of good ISO performance in that camera to up the ISO and increase the shutter speed. With any kind of action, the faster the SS the better you can freeze the motion and retain detail.
The head does look sharp, but don't be afraid of ISO 800 to 3200 with that body for increasing shutter speed.

The BG is not ideal, lots of OOF patterns, but the subtle pinks and the yellow lores are beautiful. And I did mention it is sharp where needed. Not sure what the other members think, that is my personal take. :)

[gail bisson]

I love these birds!
I would definitely change the crop to a landscape format and give more room left and below for the bird "to land into".
The BG is very busy and you could try doing a very slight gaussian blur on the BG to reduce its impact. If you have Nik Efex Pro- another trick to smooth out the BG is to go to Tonal Contrast and move the shadows and midtones sliders down to -50 or so.
You have a great pose here and it is definitely worth a rework.
Before I read Akos critique I too wondered why you were at ISO 200. I don't think I am ever less than ISO 640 and usually at ISO 800. You need this for increased SS and DOF.
Looking forward to your repost,
Gail

[Mike Poole]

Some good suggestions already above. I like the wings pose, gives a nice interest with the head almost being covered, but not quite.

Nice colours on the wings, but a bit more punch in PP may assist further. I agree with taking the extra shutter speed whenever on offer - I've deleted loads of files where I thought 1/1600th would be plenty, only to find it wasn't, and I had plenty of ISO left to use.

A little looser crop, with the above advice from Gail and Akos, and tis could be a really nice frame- I had a little play, used a curves layer to brighten the frame a little but had to reign it back in around the neck and some if the brighter pink feathers. I then added a few points of black to the 'red' channel in the 'selective colours' in photoshop. A small amount of sharpening to the bird and Gails suggestion of a gaussian blur to the BG gave me this

173942

Mike

p.s. its a Roseatte Spoonbill, not a Reddish Egret

[stuart wanuck]

like gails suggestions

[Jonathan Ashton]

Randy a very nice capture, I can see the purpose of your crop but I too think it is too tight. I too would have recommended a faster shutter speed, having said that Mike's repost certainly brought out the fine details. I look forward to more!

[Jake Levin]

I think you made a typo; this is most definitely, positively a roseate spoonbill! the crop is a bit tight. There's very little room below and behind the feet, which can be solved by adding canvas. You could probably tone down the BG with a blur filter to help reduce the distractions there. In the future, I would go with a higher ISO, faster shutter speed, and a larger aperture. These birds sure are fun to photograph.

[Randy Rimland]

thanks for the feedback, I appreciate it

fyi I was shooting these guys in a tree and they jumped me and I had too much lens, this was a full frame shot, ss was low because they weren't moving but lesson learned ouch

p.s. I started to change the title then I smiled

[Daniel Cadieux]

Yep, lesson learned, been there done that! I keep the ISO higher even when there is no action, exactly in case something like this happens. Mike has really made a big improvement on the image, but even better when finding a background that is even farther back at time of exposure. I do realize sometimes we are stuck with what we have. Beautiful spoonbill though, and I love the wing position you got it with!

[Randy Rimland]

Some good suggestions already above. I like the wings pose, gives a nice interest with the head almost being covered, but not quite.

Nice colours on the wings, but a bit more punch in PP may assist further. I agree with taking the extra shutter speed whenever on offer - I've deleted loads of files where I thought 1/1600th would be plenty, only to find it wasn't, and I had plenty of ISO left to use.

A little looser crop, with the above advice from Gail and Akos, and tis could be a really nice frame- I had a little play, used a curves layer to brighten the frame a little but had to reign it back in around the neck and some if the brighter pink feathers. I then added a few points of black to the 'red' channel in the 'selective colours' in photoshop. A small amount of sharpening to the bird and Gails suggestion of a gaussian blur to the BG gave me this

173942

Mike

p.s. its a Roseatte Spoonbill, not a Reddish Egret

thanks Mike, this looks way better

[Jonathan Spool]

For those of you that are proficient at adding canvas, would this photo be a good candidate? Or is the BR too busy?