late afternoon redpoll

[Caroline Darmo]

My first attempt with these beautiful little northern finches. Wish the end of the weed wasn't cut off & the square crop was my only option. Cloned out diagonal branch behind the bird.
Nikon D200,70-200 2.8 VR + TC 1.7
f/8, 1/320 sec
ISO 400
EV + 0.7

[Sid Garige]

Caroline,

Nice background and nice details. Image being close to square than a rectangle, all my attention was dragged into dead center at birds breast. I think is because of nature of the frame, head is not getting desired attention. may be extend canvas to a vertical composition and off center the bird?

[Rich Ikerd]

Very nicely detailed finch Caroline. I agree with Sidd's comments - the bird needs to be more off center with more room all the way around him. As is, while nice, it seems just a bit too cramped for being an effective presentation.

[Caroline Darmo]

Thanks for the comment Sid, I shot the bird too big in the frame & he didn't fit in vertical comp.

[Tony Whitehead]

Nice image - love the background and colours and textures of the bird - agree regarding more room. What lens were you using? Slightly smaller aperture would have imnproved DOF to keep top of the bird's head and maybe feet in focus. Maybe without the 1.7x would have been ideal but it is hard to remove at short notice:)

[Caroline Darmo]

Thanks for the reply Tony, added lens info 70-200 2.8. Shouldn't I worry about subject movement if I stop down more?

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Great details, pose, BG and eye contact. As you said, less focal length would have helped and I find the OOF (leaf?) between perch and tail a bit distracting. Since you clipped the seeds anyway, you could just clone them out and add more canvas top and bottom and crop a bit off the right. Maybe something like this.

[Del Cockroft]

A lovely picture, beautifully captured. Excellent detail, good exposure and focus.

[Manos Papadomanolakis]

Great details,colors and BG!!

[Doug Brown]

I love this photo! With regard to the edit that Axel did, I agree with the leaf by the foot, but I kind of like the fork at the top of the branch. Easy enough to add canvas and recompose the shot.