Vernal Hanging Parrot

[Sidharth Kodikal]

Basic bird on a stick, but I gave him extra points for hanging upside down :t3

Canon R5, 600 f4, 1.4x
1/500, f7.1, ISO 4000
Manual. Tripod.
Cropped from a horizontal original.

In the last image, I managed to add noise to the image that didn't exist in the RAW file :2eyes2:
Hopefully this is processed a bit better.

- DPP for RAW conversion. Everything else in PS.
- Layer mask for bird selection
- Warmed the BG a bit. Was shaded and appeared more blue than it really was.
- Minor bill cleanup using the spot healing tool
- After resizing TIFF for posting, mildly sharpened the bird with smart sharpen - bicubic automatic, and exported to JPEG.

Happy to share the RAW file if anybody wants to have a go at it.

[Jonathan Ashton]

A fine shot, just a suggestion, I applied curves layer and pulled the top right down just a tiny bit, I feel it gives that little more punch.

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Sid, many thanks for the file and here are my thoughts.

- Update Firmware that was available in September, you should be able to register your kit with Canon and get electronic notifications
- All the camera setting look spot on
- Mirrorless works slightly differently to DSLR, so use a larger AF area and here, enable Eye detection for a shot like this
- I would have up to ISO6400 just for a bit more SS, no issue with noise
- Shot Portrait, not Landscape, avoid cropping to portrait save your lovely pixels

Sid the file was perfectly exposed, OK the white seed heads appeared blown, but with a quick scoot of an adjustment brush everything was resolved, so NOT blown, but overall I did drop it just under a third of a stop -0.20. The bird is beautifully sharp and IMHO just the right DoF. The killer backdrop really separates the subject superbly and with no distractions the eyes just go to the subject. The little bit of white at the foot (removed) gave a good WB starting point, it was then just a case of being selective with the colours, upped the Vibrancy and then just added some Saturation. I just added a few filters on the BKG just to add a little depth and light, subtle, but that's the whole point. No Contrast added as I wanted to retail the fine detail.

Sid this image just needed only a few adjustments and I ran Enhance which is Lr/ACR default NR at 24%, it was really minimal as the file was so clean and NO Dust bunnies. You can do more and take it further, but I felt this wasn't the aim here.

I would just check the Calibration of your monitor ensuring its set for Photography and then calibrate it, always calibrate about 30 minutes after turning the monitor on, never cold. If you are using DPP then find someone who can run you through it all, I know Canon indirectly do a on-line tuition which I would think takes you from Cradle to Grave, not literally I hope and you can access this as and when and keep going back, but it comes at a price around $100 which is pricey, but....

You are nailing the hard part, the capture, now it's just honing your PP skills, just keep it simple.

Colours are subjective but hopefully this has indicated a lovely capture, all the best, hope this helps.

TFS
Steve

[Sidharth Kodikal]

So very well processed, Steve. Many thanks!
I absolutely love your treatment of the BG. Subtle but effective. Whilst mine was a boring and even green, you managed to extract a lot more depth from it.
Really enjoying the looser crop too.
I also love the pop you managed to give the bird.
I'll use this as a baseline to re-process from scratch.

I've always been a DPP user, but even years later, it's as sub-par a user experience as it ever was. I will consider switching to ACR while I'm starting from scratch.

This was my first outing with a freshly unboxed R5, and the fully charged battery was drained within 3-4 hours. I did upgrade the firmware as soon as I got home, but haven't had a chance to photograph since. Hoping for improvements all around.
I should also invest in a good monitor. Currently I either use my macbook pro M2 max, or a cheapo LG 4K monitor connected to the MBP.

Many thanks once again, Steve. You've given me a lot of leads to work on.

[Joseph Przybyla]

Hi Sid, you may have been away for a while but you have come roaring back. Lovely image, beautiful colors, pure background, simple composition. I love the image. thank you for sharing.

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Sid, at the end of the day we spend many thousands of $$$$$$ on our kit, but don't feel the aspect of PP is key, however it is just as important, if not more so, as it can make or break an image. Using the MBP as the workhorse is fine, coupled up to the monitor, however you need to know what you are seeing is reflective (to a degree), as monitors vary, our vision certainly does and ultimately what light is around and or, bouncing onto the screen. This is why having a calibrated monitor is paramount, at least you know it's with a certain amount of tolerance, I always view an image in PS, just a habit. You don't need to spend a fortune, just a good monitor perhaps 27 in, that you can adjust, correctly setting the Black point, Gamma and luminance (brightness of screen), most manufactures give you a guideline ie 80-100, mine is sett to 110 and after calibration the numbers are validated to an Industry standard.



I've always been a DPP user, but even years later, it's as sub-par a user experience as it ever was. I will consider switching to ACR while I'm starting from scratch.

It's you call Sid, whatever you are happiest in using, certainly with ACR you just drill down the various modules, just make sure it is displaying a 16bit tiff are conversion, not 8, but also set to ProRGB, and not Adobe RGB 1998.



This was my first outing with a freshly unboxed R5, and the fully charged battery was drained within 3-4 hours.

I would recommend the battery grip, the camera sits better in the hand and you have all the buttons to hand when you flip from Landscape to Portrait, plus a second battery. If you don't feel you want to invest in the grip, just buy another battery, nothing worse than running out of batter when you have the 'money shot' right in front of the viewfinder. :bg3:

Lastly 4k monitor, do you need it, I know Arash kept banging on about it, but.... Yes the colour is marginally better, much sharper, but remember these were designed for video not stills. The two I have work perfectly fine, what I see on screen is what I get printed. We pour over how sharp is an image, but it's simple, is the Raw sharp or soft and if its soft, no matter how much sharpening you apply it's still going to be soft, so bin!

Enjoy and lets see some more images. :cheers:

[Dorian Anderson]

I love the pose and perch. I've seen many similar images of this bird and plant over the years and think your colors are in better line with your original those than Steve's repost.
This species is lime green, so I'm not sure why it's gone more yellow in Steve's version. And what was the BG? Was it trees/forest/plants? If yes, I'm not sure why it's gone gray/lifeless
in Steve's treatment. He absolutely nailed the crop, so I might rework the colors from that starting point.

[Steve Kaluski]

This species is lime green, so I'm not sure why it's gone more yellow in Steve's version.

Hi Dorian, the purpose of the RP was to illustrate to Sid, the Raw was absolutely perfect, not being there, I cannot judge the 'true' colour of the species, but that wasn't the point of the exercise.

[Sidharth Kodikal]

I love the pose and perch. I've seen many similar images of this bird and plant over the years and think your colors are in better line with your original those than Steve's repost.
This species is lime green, so I'm not sure why it's gone more yellow in Steve's version. And what was the BG? Was it trees/forest/plants? If yes, I'm not sure why it's gone gray/lifeless
in Steve's treatment. He absolutely nailed the crop, so I might rework the colors from that starting point.

Thanks Dorian.
I've seen some of those saturated shots of this species with lime greens, blues and reds. All the individuals I saw were comparatively understated :)
The BG was a distant stand of trees in shade, and had some greys in it.

It's interesting. Picking up a camera after a 9+ year break, I had almost no issues with clicking photos - it's pretty much muscle memory.
Post-processing on the other hand, almost fully wiped out of my memory :)
What I gratefully took from Steve's repost wasn't so much the color correctness, but the workflow. That's been immensely helpful.

Agree on the crop. Need to stop cropping so tight.

[Sidharth Kodikal]

Reprocessed with ACR. These are the colors as I remember them.
I couldn't quite get the depth in BG that Steve managed though, but hopefully looks better than my OP.

Comments and suggestions welcomed.