Roseate Skimmer

[Tim Vidrine]

This is the first male roseate skimmer of the year for me. For the last month or so, only females were visiting my backyard. I was able to capture this image prior to a thunderstorm when the winds calmed down for a few minutes. Image processed in ACR. Desaturation and sharpening done in CS3. The branch looks a little hot, but the histogram shows no clipping. C&C welcome.

07/19/2008 16:40
Canon 40D
Canon 180mm + 1.4TC
iso 200, f/8, 1/20s
Av + 1/3
Eval
Canon 580EX @ 1/8 with Omni-Bounce
Novoflex focus rail

[Gus Cobos]

Hi Tim,
I like the composition and your dragon fly. I modified your image just slightly by cloning out the diagonal portion of the branch to make the lines flow smoothly, and I cloned in some texture on the branch from the portions that were not blown out I hope you like. I also lightened the backgroun a tad and sprinkled a little sharpening. you can finish it off by cloning in some red color to the lower part of the body...:cool:

[Gus Cobos]

P.S. you might see some traces of post processing due to the fact that I did this very fast, sorry...:D

[Ed Vatza]

I like this one, Tim. The perspective seems perfect to me. Color and background is excellent. The perch looks good. Only possible hot spot looks to be just in front of the front legs. Nice.

[Tim Vidrine]

Gus, thanks for taking the time to make the mods. I'll run with what you did and see what happens. I liked the image, but something did not seem right with it. Hopefully, I can improve it going down the path you pointed me to.

Thanks,
Tim

[Tim Vidrine]

Ed, looks like we posted at the same time and I missed your post.

Here is a rework of the image. I cloned some of the branch and lightened the background some. I did not want to go too far with the lighting of the background due to some artifacts showing up. I did not add any more sharpening, but did some selective sharpening. I did not sharpen the branch. Does the rework improve it any?

Thanks guys for taking the time.

Tim

[Steve Maxson]

What a striking dragonfly - we don't have these up in this part of the world. Nice pose and sharpness. I like the reworked perch as the original was rather distracting. It's interesting (to me, at least) that he is using only 4 legs to grasp the branch while the front pair are tucked up next to his head. Well done.

[Tim Vidrine]

Steve, thanks. I've observed this perching behavior in other skimmers as well. I have photos of slaty, great blue, and golden wing skimmers having this same posture when perched.

[Robert O'Toole]

Well I am a little late with a reply but I just finished posting a how to on this same subject for one of Steve's images:

http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/showthread.php?t=16313

I did the same here. New layer, darkened, hide all mask and brush the dark tones in with the brush tool. I have covered this in my APTATS 1 Cd and have expanded on this technique in my new CD that I am trying to complete.

Robert

[Robert O'Toole]

Many skimmers will perch exactly like this. I really like the alert / threat pose, with wings up and all legs on the perch.

Robert

[Tim Vidrine]

Thanks Robert. I have your first CD, so I'll take a look again.

[Julie Kenward]

Tim, one question...did you run any noise reduction on this? That might clean up some of those artifacts you're trying to hide.

[Tim Vidrine]

Julie, I ran noise reduction in ACR and used Neat Image once I started in CS3. I think my biggest problem is not having enough data in the dark greens. When I try brightening up the greens, I start seeing banding. If I leave it alone, the greens are pretty smooth.


Thanks,
Tim

[Mike Moats]

Hey Tim, a very nice pose and Robert corrected the over exposed areas on his backside.

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hey Tim,
I was going to show you the thread of Robert re-working Steve's post just below (since I was responding bottom up)......but he got to it. Big improvement in the PP but vry nice capture and comp by you.