Common Goldeneye

[Luis Villablanca]

I've been trying to get a good shot of the Goldeneyes that visit the local lake in the winter.
The exposure is sort of challenging since their colors range from the reflective white to dark black.
This drake seems to be molting since I can still see some of the brown plumage underneath the white
feathers. It's the only one that cooperated yesterdy though. The rest of th ducks just moved away as soon as they saw me. :)
http://luisv.smugmug.com/photos/749308285_HpUWi-O.jpg
Common Goldeneye
Shoreline Lake

Canon 7D + 500L + 1.4x TC + tripod
1/2500s, f/8, ISO 800, flash -1EV, manual exposure.
I extended the canvas to the right and changed the blue color of some reflections to match the rest of the background (cloned part of the a/b channels in Lab mode).


Have a Merry Xmas and a wonderful 2010.
--
Luis

[Ilija Dukovski]

Good work with the exp. I like the water and unusual pose of the bird. I wish the bird was in full
breeding plumage. The shine on the bill is bit distracting too. Could you tone it down a bit?
In any case nicely done.

[arash_hazeghi]

Very nice Luis, details are good love the low angle too. might consider removing the bill shine.

Merry Xmass and happy holidays!

Arash

[Robert Becker]

Great shot of one of my favorite ducks. I don't mind the shine on the bill so much...it tells me the bird is wet. It's odd that out of the thousands of wood duck shots I've seen, the bills are usually blown out completely and no one seems to mind.

[Juan Aragonés]

Good exposure job Luis, I like a lot the low shooting angle and the pose of the bird. Eye contact is really nice and love the water drops in the back of the duck.

[Luis Villablanca]

Thanks for the comments. Here is a version with the suggested changes.
http://luisv.smugmug.com/photos/749748507_Ykxii-O.jpg

[Ofer Levy]

Excellent exposure control, sharpness, detail and low angle. Repost looks better IMO.