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Gus Hallgren
01-14-2008, 09:11 AM
Hi, A little story about this 9 month old Great Horned Owl: Born December 2006 in nest high in Eucalyptus tree beside our home, Green Valley, Az. In March, 2007, with siblings, Mother and Father chased Raven family from park a block away and took up permanent residence. Family roosts in different tall trees within 1/4 mile of residence nightly. This photo was taken in August about 3 PM with a Olympus SP 550 UZ Digicam 18X Optical on a Tripod using Program Mode, 200 ISO, Auto WB, -0.30EV, F:4.5, 1/125. Note: Space above Owl's head was increased 40 px using one of Robert OToole's repair techniques in APTATS-1 put out by Arthur Morris. BTW: Every year different birds take residence in Eucalyptus tree in nest about 75', Owls last year, Raven's year before, and Cooper Hawks previous to that. Hope I haven't been too long winded. :-) Gus

Alfred Forns
01-14-2008, 10:41 AM
.... no you haven't Got some nice families there !!!!

This is one difficult image to extend canvas Getting all the density differences and patters cause the problem Might work the highlight top right of the head You should be able to tame it !!! Good luck with these guys !!!

Judd Patterson
01-16-2008, 12:25 AM
I enjoyed the story and the huge eyes on this owl! Such a cute juvenile that you captured quite well. It would be worth your effort to try and tone down the highlights that Alfred noted, as well as spending a bit more time on the top of the image. As things look now, your canvas extension shows identical leaves right above the original leaves. This looks unnatural and can be fixed up with several methods. My personal preference would be careful use of the clone brush to create some new leaves...borrowing from other areas of the image. Hope to see more of these Great-horned Owls!

Gus Hallgren
01-16-2008, 11:12 AM
Hi Judd, Thanks for your suggestions. Yes, I agree with both you and Alfred about the highlights, and your comments of the extension. Not making excuses, but haste makes waste, and I should have taken the time to clone individual leaves to make it look natural. Like your website.