Dunlin with Reflection

[Mike Landwehr]

Hi,

I'm not sure whether this belongs in this forum, or in the "Eager to Learn" forum.

This image is a puzzle for me when it comes to cropping. Whether to 1) leave it along, 2) crop it a bit tighter on all sides, 3) crop it square (rather than the current 5:4 aspect ratio), or 4) clone out the feet and tail on the reflection and crop out the rest of the reflection, retaining only the "top" dunlin, with perhaps a 2:1 aspect ratio crop.

Any comments greatly appreciated.

Tiger Tail Beach, on Marco Island
1D Mark II N
ISO 500
500 mm + 1.4x TC
1/1600 at f/8

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Very nice light and pose. The reflection is not perfect but I would only crop some off the bottom without cutting the reflection.

[Juan Aragonés]

I think that I would go for a landscape croping with more room at the right. The reflection is too good to be croped. super nice licht, action and background. The spreading of the tail and wings is awesome!

[John Chardine]

I think this is a super image and for sure belongs here. Agree that a small crop from the bottom would be optimal.

[Nathan Lovas]

Beautiful image...i think the crop i very close...i would like to see a square crop to see the difference...beautiful image

[Fabs Forns]

Very beautiful as presented. Different crops would be optional.

[Daniel Cadieux]

I like the crop as is, although I'm sure some others versions could work too. I kinda wish the the blue was a better hue than here, but that is highly subjective :-)

[Arthur Morris]

Mike, Mike, Mike. I am with John. This is a superb image. I gasped when it opened. I cropped it a bit and did a small CW rotation. Funny thing is depending on what you lined up from the bird to the reflection you got a different suggested degrees of rotation. I went with the two long toe. on the bird's left foot.

[Dave Phillips]

wow, awesome image......I like cropping a wee bit off bottom.
Sometimes I just make a series of low res crops for comparison, and soon one will pop out at me as being optimal

The reflection is superb

[Tony Whitehead]

Excellent, Mike. Well done - little bit off the bottom is good.

[Mike Landwehr]

Thanks to each of you who took the time to comment. Your input was helpful, and much appreciated!

Mike