Semipalmated Plover

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Photographed on Long Island on a sunny evening. There were a few clouds here and there and I experimented with the different light.

http://www.pbase.com/axelhi/image/102499046/original.jpg

1D3, 500f4, 1.4x, 1/500s, f/8, EC +0.33, ISO 400

[Tony Whitehead]

Lovely low angle and colours Axel, really jumps off the screen. DOF covers the bird well

[Manos Papadomanolakis]

Really,I Iike the angle,composition,bg and the light!

[Melvin Grey]

Lovely intimate feel from this low angle, Axel. Perfect depth of field and full range of tones from the soft light.
Melvin

[Juan Carlos Vindas]

Lovely image! the low angle works perfect here. Deatails as well as BG are both very good.

[Doug Brown]

Like the environment and the pose Axel. The eye gets a little lost with the bright whites above the beak on my monitor.

[Ramon M. Casares]

Low angle is FANTASTIC, light couldn't be better, sharpness and color are great and BG looks perfect, love it as you can see. Congratulations!

[Linda Robbins]

Excellent pose and I love the clean simple bg and low perspective. The whites are a tad over and I think the image is greatly improved by decreasiing the contrast about 6 points with a curves adjustment.

[Steve Canuel]

As mentioned, angle is excellent. A nice, simple image.

[WIlliam Maroldo]

I like the image, the low perspective, the sharpness, the simplicity. I do have a question though, about merges. Strictly speaking, it is my understanding that it is undesirable for the background to "merge" with the subject. For example, in this image (on my monitor) there are areas around the bird's breast that are virtually identical in color(or lack of color as it is white) to the background. In other words might this be a better image if there were, for example, more of a blue cast to the background? Now this comes up for me quite a bit in hi-key images, where there are white, or very light areas of the bird that create what could be thought of as "merges"with the white background. This might not even be a problem. I was just wondering. regards~Bill

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Excellent pose and I love the clean simple bg and low perspective. The whites are a tad over and I think the image is greatly improved by decreasiing the contrast about 6 points with a curves adjustment.

Thanks, Linda! I will give that a try.

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the image, the low perspective, the sharpness, the simplicity. I do have a question though, about merges. Strictly speaking, it is my understanding that it is undesirable for the background to "merge" with the subject. For example, in this image (on my monitor) there are areas around the bird's breast that are virtually identical in color(or lack of color as it is white) to the background. In other words might this be a better image if there were, for example, more of a blue cast to the background? Now this comes up for me quite a bit in hi-key images, where there are white, or very light areas of the bird that create what could be thought of as "merges"with the white background. This might not even be a problem. I was just wondering. regards~Bill

I agree that most images look better if there is a clear separation between BG and plumage or bill, etc. On my monitor there is a pretty clear difference between the white plumage and light blue BG and the soft light is what I like about this image.

[Beth Goffe]

I wasn't sure about the light background at first but I like the mood it evokes. Very pretty plover. My monitor shows the bird clearly from the background and no merges, too.

[WIlliam Maroldo]

Axel: Yeah, I agree. No merges. Should have realized my monitor was set too bright. Great image! regards~Bill

[Maxis Gamez]

Hi Axel,

Excellent composition and low angle. Love it!