Failed Nest building #101

[Randy Stout]

This nice spoonie was imaged while out with James on the Hooptie Deux. Early in the morning, so nice light to work with. Title comes from the puny, almost invisible stick this bird was taking home to his nest. It could take a long time to build that nest :)

D300 500mm/4 at f/6.3 1/4000 ISO 800 Aperture priority -.7

Post work - very slight curves adjustment, crop to about 70% of original for comp. This is the original catchlight, no post work on it.

Comments always appreciated.

Randy

[denise ippolito]

Randy, Beautiful details and love the composition-Very nice!!!

[Ramon M. Casares]

Great pose, light, detail, colors, BG, and comp. Love it. Congratulations! Loved the tittle too :D

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Great light and details. This guy really needs a refresher course. :)

[Cal Walters]

Randy, I really like the morning sun has warmed up the colors on the the bird and brought out the features in the face. The stick is humorous - I wish it was 15% bigger so the joke was more evident and that the nest would get built before the species evolves. The only thing I find distracting is the size of the thigh - it just seems massive. Now I'm no flying spoonie expert, but the bird seems turned in some way to make it more pronounced. I think I see it more because it is framed between dark feet and a dark underside of the bill which moves my attention to the center faster so my line of visual study is broken. With all the great images coming from the Hooptie, I gotta find a way to get there.

[Stu Bowie]

Very well exposed Randy, and love the colours on him. This is nice and sharp, and he certainly needs more wood for his nest. Well captured.

[Kim Rollins]

Randy,

Nice bird.
Good colors.
Good bg.
Good job!


If it were mine I think I would try a Levels Adjustment Layer but probably moving only the middle slider to brighten it just a tad (set 1.10 - 1.15 or about).

Thanks for sharing this.

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

Randy

Love the light, wing position and the colors. It is beautiful indeed. I cannot fault it in any way. Super image mate. Really. :)

[david cramer]

You've got plenty of shutter speed so the iso could be lowered. I'd brighten the image just a bit. Lovely details and pose with nice colors. That nest ain't ever gonna get built.

[Randy Stout]

Thanks all:

Kim & David:

I did try a lighter version, but my memory of it was as an early morning time, so I did want to maintain that feel. This is a good case of where the context of the photo doesn't neccesarily come across for the viewer, so the processing decisions aren't obvious.

David:

I was shooting birds in much dimmer lighting, when this guy flew out, hence the ISO. If I had just been doing flying birds, lowering the ISO would have been a better choice. Good pickup.

Randy

[Kim Rollins]

Thanks all:

Kim & David:

I did try a lighter version, but my memory of it was as an early morning time, so I did want to maintain that feel. This is a good case of where the context of the photo doesn't neccesarily come across for the viewer, so the processing decisions aren't obvious.

(snip)

Randy

You were the one who was there so that makes perfect sense to me Randy.

It is a very good image as posted and my suggest to tryLevels was not because I find fault in it.

Well done!