Rufous Hummingbird

[Paul Kusmin]

Thought I'd share my first Rufous of the year, taken earlier today in between showers.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3650/3390311447_27116931d8_o.jpg

Exposure: 1/160
Aperture: f/8.0
Focal Length: 850 mm
ISO Speed: 400
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: On

Thanks for looking, C&C welcome :)

[Doug Brown]

I like the overall mood and color palette of the image; there might be a little greenish cast, but it doesn't bother me. While the feathers up front look nice and sharp, the ones towards the back could stand a bit more sharpening. I would remove the second twig.

[Arthur Morris]

Paul. Do you accept house guests????? I have been lusting over this bird for years. As presented this is a lovely image, but there is a huge red cast, and it is way oversaturated--there were lots of overexposed pixels before I de-SATed it 10 points. Lightened the throat with a QM after balancing the color.

I love the OP but think that it is that much better now.

[Doug Brown]

You're the master Artie!

[Arthur Morris]

Thanks Doug. But I am still learning. And I still wish that this one were mine....

[Ilija Dukovski]

Great post, re-post over top.
The gorget is just fantastic
showing two colors at once,
You don't get that too often.

Congrats!

[Ramon M. Casares]

Artie did it for me, thanks :) I love it, great pose, light, exposure, BG and detail, repost is not much better but way better :) Congratulations!

[Paul Kusmin]

thanks everyone and thank you Artie, I'm quite pleased with your re-do, and glad you took the time.
I'll be taking your advice to heart when re-processing, cheers.

PS, give a shout out next time you are in Vancouver, I'd be happy to show you : )

[Peter Hawrylyshyn]

Paul -
A great pic and envious that HB's have already arrived.

I see that the photo is oversaturated in the reds, but can i ask about the color cast? If you sample RGB values for white colors in the neck , find red is about equal to green with low blue vlaues. From Art Wolfe's book this suggests a yellow cast. If you try Filter Blur Average technique - get a yellow green grey color. So not sure how it's a red cast. Maybe this is just semantics?

Artie how did you correct the color cast ? Did you use level adjustment layers or the technique recommended by CHarles Glatzer at: http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/showthread.php?t=7752

Thanks for sharing
Peter

[Peter Hawrylyshyn]

Sorry - the reference should be to Tim Grey's book:
Low Red = Cyan Green Low = Magenta and Blue Low = Yellow casts

[Arthur Morris]

Hi Peter,

My recollection is that this is not exactly what you asked me via e-mail but I will take a crack at it.

Paul - A great pic and envious that HB's have already arrived. I see that the photo is oversaturated in the reds, but can i ask about the color cast?

You can ask Paul anything. Or me.

If you sample RGB values for white colors in the neck , find red is about equal to green with low blue vlaues. From Art Wolfe's book this suggests a yellow cast. If you try Filter Blur Average technique - get a yellow green grey color. So not sure how it's a red cast. Maybe this is just semantics?

You are talking about the whites in the neck. I was talking about the whole image, which is simply too red.

Artie how did you correct the color cast?

I used the Average Blur Color Trick. Details are available in the latest update of our Digital Basics File. Do you have Digital Basics? I spend dozens of hours here each week and have given away tons of stuff and all of my time pretty much for free. Much of the stuff that I have written aboout in the Forums has been excerpted from Digital Basics and other BAA publications (and I have noted such). As I do need to make a living there is some stuff that I need to save for customers only. In addition it is no fun re-typing long sections that you have already written.

Did you use level adjustment layers or the technique recommended by CHarles Glatzer at: http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/showthread.php?t=7752

No. The technique that I use is much faster and much simpler. As screen capture shows, the RGB values are R=169. G=155. B=123. To me, that is a blue cast. To learn how to eliminate the cast and fine tune the color balancing, please see the Digital Basics File. It has tons of great info and tips and will be updated as long as I am alive and photographing. (I guess that that is somewhat oxymoronic....)

[Arthur Morris]

ps: I do not understand the color wheel but I know how to correct color casts! Amazing.

ps to Paul: You are most welcome. I just may show up at your door one day!

[Paul Kusmin]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3570/3393442936_d05a655611_o.jpg

did a quick re-process, adjusting the Colour Balance and like this much better than my original.

After sleeping on the original image I looked at it again with fresh eyes and it definitely seemed too red, I looked at my camera settings and had my WB set to Flash, I think that might have contributed to it.
I was playing around with WB recently but I think I should just leave it at Auto, like it used to be.

thanks again!

[Arthur Morris]

Hey Paul, I use Auto 99% of the time. I like the re-post but you could have opened up the darher areas of the gorget. Still a wonderful image.

[Arthur Morris]

Paul, The image with your last repost is unavailable. Avoiding problems like this is one big benefit of a BPN membership: less than 5 1/2 cents per day!

ps: There will be a link to this thread in today's Bulletin.