American White Pelican

[Joseph Przybyla]

I captured this image at Lake Morton in Lakeland, Florida. Comments and critique welcomed and appreciated. Thank you for viewing.

Nikon D500
Nikon 80-400mm F/4.5-5.6 VRII AF-S ED, camera and lens supported by a monopod
1/500 F/5.6 Matrix Metering EV +1 ISO 180 Auto 1 WB, image captured at 195mm
Post processed in Lightroom Classic, Photoshop CC 2021 and Neat Image for noise reduction when needed
Cropped for composition and presentation

P.S. Learn more about Lake Morton in the BAA Middle Florida Photography Site Guide that Artie and I co-authored. It is available at this link The BAA Middle of Florida Site Guide (https://birdsasart-shop.com/the-baa-middle-of-florida-photographic-site-guide/)

[Steve Kaluski]

Cool portrait Joe, but I would loose the blue in the plumage and perhaps take a sliver off the top, WDYT? I feel you are underselling the image here Joe, you still have a lot more detail in that white plumage, it's awesome, even at this size, so in the raw WOW, nice work.

TFS
Steve

[Brian Sump]

Joe, I agree with Steve on the blue in the plumage.

Beautiful portrait from my angle. I am good with the crop - it looks like 4x5 already right, so next option would be square?

And I find the details are great. If you can eek more out fine but personally I like the whites remaining white (in LR I simply took the blue down in the HSL panel and it did wonders).

TFS

[Joseph Przybyla]

Steve and Brian, thanks for viewing, commenting and suggesting improvements. Here is a edit and repost with the blues tamed. Nice to have others look at an image I missed how blue the shadows were, guess I was concentrating elsewhere. Thanks again.

Brian I went with the 4x5 so the the bill would point diagonally to the lower left corner, just me.

[Brian Sump]

Steve and Brian, thanks for viewing, commenting and suggesting improvements. Here is a edit and repost with the blues tamed. Nice to have others look at an image I missed how blue the shadows were, guess I was concentrating elsewhere. Thanks again.

Brian I went with the 4x5 so the the bill would point diagonally to the lower left corner, just me.

Like it a lot Joe!

FWIW, I was agreeing with your crop saying that to go any wider or shorter you would have to go square. That could look good but I think I like it as is :-)

Steve, what say you?

[Joseph Przybyla]

Like it a lot Joe!

FWIW, I was agreeing with your crop saying that to go any wider or shorter you would have to go square. That could look good but I think I like it as is :-)

Steve, what say you?

Thanks Brian, I appreciate you clarifying.

[Steve Kaluski]

(in LR I simply took the blue down in the HSL panel and it did wonders).

If you do that guys it's a GLOBAL adjustment, killing the blue of the water and therefore looses a lot of the nice subtleties from the OP.

Joe, very quickly done as I'm rushing, but this is with a sliver off the top and getting some more detail out of the whites using the OP. I might also suggest just opening the eye up a bit more too.

[Joseph Przybyla]

If you do that guys it's a GLOBAL adjustment, killing the blue of the water and therefore looses a lot of the nice subtleties from the OP.

Joe, very quickly done as I'm rushing, but this is with a sliver off the top and getting some more detail out of the whites using the OP. I might also suggest just opening the eye up a bit more too.

Hey Steve, your right I did to it globally and lost the blue in the water. Here is an edit removing the blue from the bird locally and working on the detail in the whites. Stay healthy my friend...

P.S. Between all of us we will get this portrait perfect.

[Brian Sump]

If you do that guys it's a GLOBAL adjustment, killing the blue of the water and therefore looses a lot of the nice subtleties from the OP.

Joe, very quickly done as I'm rushing, but this is with a sliver off the top and getting some more detail out of the whites using the OP. I might also suggest just opening the eye up a bit more too.

Yes I totally understand that thanks. You would want to mask the bird and reduce that way ideally - this was within the context of a quick LR adjustment.

[Joseph Przybyla]

Yes I totally understand that thanks. You would want to mask the bird and reduce that way ideally - this was within the context of a quick LR adjustment.

Thanks Brian, you and I did a quick fix but to reduce the blues just on the bird was the correct fix. Easy to do using the Adjustment Brush in LR and reduce the saturation in those areas. I don't know if you use the Adjustment Brush in LR, it is a great tool.

[Paul Burdett]

Hi Joseph. Yes...looks great now. One more thing to make it perfect to me: clone out that little diagonal dark bit bottom right corner.

[David Roach]

Just another JP classic. TFS

PS
Final post nails it...

[John Mack]

Love these pelican portraits. This one is great. Works very well high key.

[Dorian Anderson]

I really like this Joseph. I've been lusting after a headshot of this species for years, so I'm envious of this result and opportunity. Detail is outstanding, and I like the soft pastel tones behind. I like how Steve had rendered those but prefer your brighter whites. Marrying the two would be great! A very sweet image regardless.

[Joseph Przybyla]

Thanks everyone for viewing and commenting, much appreciated.