Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl

[Alan Murphy]

Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl

Raymondville, TX

D3, 600, ISO 320, f8 @ 1/1600, -0.3 EV, fill @ -1.3.

I spent a nice afternoon at the San Migeulito ranch with a pair of very tame Owls. If you spend enough time with them and follow them around you can pick off some nice unobstructed images.

[Stu Bowie]

Great eye contact Alan. Comp wise, I would maybe move him down in the frame a bit, otherwise a super image.

[Mike Lentz]

Alan,

So you want a critique on this image??

Okay.... here goes.

Background... blended tones of the same color A+
DOF... lets see F/8 pretty much perfect
Sharpness... no haloes or sharpening artifacts so perfect!
Comp... the tree and how it is pretty much determined the Owls placement. I might be inclined to clone out the small brown thingees up top and crop that space out which would change where the Owl is in the photo.

I'm curious what you think as I generally refer to your images as a guide to some extent in what I do. I think its a winner!!

[Tony Whitehead]

Superb, as expected from you, Alan. Excellent use of flash to open up the shaded areas under the brow. BG, perch with tufts of foliage and owl with direct eye contact all combine into an excellent image. A co-operative subject helps but attention to detail is required to put it all together as you have done here. Well done.

[Dan Walker]

Awsome subject, sweet image! I love the perch with the ball moss, BG is great. Excellent job isolating him. Don't see too many photos of these. If I tried to come up with one thing to change, I wish the shadow on the eyes was not so prominent, but I'm not complaining:)

[Alan Murphy]

Alan,

So you want a critique on this image??

Okay.... here goes.

Background... blended tones of the same color A+
DOF... lets see F/8 pretty much perfect
Sharpness... no haloes or sharpening artifacts so perfect!
Comp... the tree and how it is pretty much determined the Owls placement. I might be inclined to clone out the small brown thingees up top and crop that space out which would change where the Owl is in the photo.

I'm curious what you think as I generally refer to your images as a guide to some extent in what I do. I think its a winner!!

Thanks Mike,

I think there are a few crop options here if your willing to give something else up. Those brown thingees (such a part of their habitat) makes the image IMO, so I did not want to take the top down anymore. Plus I want that pod to be uncropped with some green at the top. I even left a little piece of pod at the bottom to continue the story out of the bottom of the frame.

Besides the subject within the frame, another way to gauge the comp is in the balance of the negitive space in the BG. In this case does the volume of green sit nicely within the frame, or is it top or bottom heavy? It feels right to me, but would love to hear what others think.

Good discussion guys.

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

Super image Alan. I feel though the owl is a bit too close to the center line. Still rocks in a big way as is.

[Trey Barron]

Very nice. Comp looks good to me and the BG balances well with the habitat of the owl. Cool species.

[Arthur Morris]

Killer. I would actually like to see this a bit wider to include brown thingies top and our left. And more to our left probably would not hurt either. Despite all that, I will gladly take this if you do not want it.

[Peter Hawrylyshyn]

Alan -
For all the reasons cited above - a technically superb photo. Anyone would be thrilled to have this photo in their collection.

With the crop, you've broken some of the "supposed" standard rules : position the bird equidistant on the centre line or use the rule of thirds for a vertical comp. WHen i look at the photo, its centre is negative green space , my eyes want to go to the owl, but the tree/branches lead me out of the photo.

I admit i'm not an expert, but i would have chosen a tighter centred vertical crop on the owl, or cut space off the bottom (to level of brown pods) to place owl onto lower third on right side and still make it a habitat image.

Thanks for sharing
PH

[Jim Neiger]

Alan,

This is just killer! I like it just the way it is.

[John Blumenkamp]

Awesome image Alan... I love it as is, but if mine I might experiment cropping from the left, at least enough to crop the broken branch segment and see how it looks.

Fantastic as is, with killer detail, light and background. ;)

[Kirsten Frost]

Super image Alan - Lighting brought out the colours nicely, especially the green background. Love the environment shown