White-crowned Sparrow adult plumage

[James Prudente]

http://www.pbase.com/silverbowff/image/91245831.jpg

40D, TC 1.4X II, 500 f4 L IS, f8, 1/500sec., ISO 400, AV, AiServo, AWB, Eval. meter, tripod, out the kitchen nook window. 1-04-08, Vail, AZ, Cholla Cactus skeleton perch.

[Peter Hawrylyshyn]

like the bird, pose, sharpness, could perhaps be a tad brighter
but i find the cactus distracting - it draws your eyes away from the bird (especially left most branch)

i'd suggest perhaps a vertical crop cutting out the left half of image with cauctus

nicely done

[Tim McIntyre]

I agree with Peter ,the perch is just too dominant
Tim

[Bonnie Block]

Jim, this would have been a fantastic shot had the forward arm of that cactus not been there. Great background and neat colors.

[Steve Foss]

Well, here goes my take.

I like the lighting. It is gentle and diffuse, and I don't find the image too dark for my monitor or my taste.

I appreciate how the cholla grays complement the sparrow grays, and I like the buttery BG, which has some contrast and transition to add a bit of drama to the whole. If I think of this as a tight bird portrait, it somewhat fails the test because of the cutoff view as already mentioned. If I think of it more as a fairly tight environmental portrait, however, it gets a higher grade and I'm not distracted by the cholla arm. As someone who gets tons of W-C sparrows up here during migration, it's pretty neat to see one in a desert environment.

I did see that one of the cholla holes in the middle of the comp goes all the way through to the background, and that was just a bit jarring, but that is truly fine grit.