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Charles Wesley
08-09-2009, 01:49 PM
Here's an image from the spring. This guy was very cocky and full of confidence. I caught him post preening. Something has his attention. Tried to make the best of A.F. backgrounds.

Canon EOS- 1D, EF 500 f/ 4.0 L, 550 EX flash, BB and Wimberley on tripod. My exposure was 1/ 125 sec. @ f/ 9.0 ISO 200.

Enjoy,
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Charlie Wesley
St. Augustine Beach, FL
http://naturesphotographs.com
Randy Stout
08-09-2009, 02:29 PM
Charlie:

Good looking bird, sharp, nice HA.

To my eye, he is a bit underexposed, and I think you can bring up the whites a bit, so he doesn't look quite so grey. The whites are around 235 max on my machine, and setting the whitepoint on the brightest current white will perk him up nicely. I might also consider a crop off of about 40% of the open space at the top.
Thanks for sharing.

Randy
Charles Wesley
08-09-2009, 03:21 PM
Randy,

Thanks for the suggestions. I was not able to brighten the whites any higher than 247.
Let me know about the repost if you can.
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Charlie Wesley
St. Augustine Beach, FL
Daniel Cadieux
08-09-2009, 07:02 PM
The repost looks much better...the comp is now nicely balanced and the bird "whiter" (although I think it can be pushed slightly more). Now I only wish that branch merging with the egret wasn't there :-)
Harshad Barve
08-09-2009, 10:46 PM
Repost works nicely here,
lovely image , agreed with Daniel
TFS
Joerg Rockenberger
08-09-2009, 11:07 PM
Repost is much better. But I find the perch a bit overwhelming. JR
Randy Stout
08-10-2009, 07:03 AM
Charlie:

Sorry for the slow response.

I think it looks much nicer on the repost. There is just a bit of room left on the whites, but it is pretty darn close now. Crop works better this way as well, IMHO.

Yes, the perch is a bit large and the merge/blocked feet aren't ideal, but I do like it, esp. now that the bird stands out more. You could clone out the branch intersecting his body if you feel comfortable with that sort of manipulation.

Randy
Ray Rozema
08-10-2009, 09:16 PM
Beautiful image the repost is mch better. I wonder about toning down/desaturating the bright greens, a little bit in the BG.