Black Belly Plover ~ Upper Beach Plants

[Jim Fenton]

Late afternoon last week on the upper, vegetated areas of the beach at Sanibel Island, Florida

Nikon D300, Nikon 500 AFS-VR, ISO 320, f 6.3

[Jim Poor]

Nice pose and I like the intimate feel of the bird among the leaves. I might darken the FG leaves just a bit to draw attention back to the bird, and there is a prominent halo around the beak.

[Jim Fenton]

The prominent halo is sort of interesting. Even when the in camera sharpening is set to NONE during the raw conversion, it's still there....my guess is due to the high contrast between the beak and the whitish colored sand.

Sharpening was actually accomplished with a quick mask, well inside the perimeter of the beak in that particular portion of the image.

Good suggestion on the foreground foliage darkening.

Thanks!

[Jim Poor]

If it is there during raw conversion, I haven't a clue. I was thinking maybe if you used bi cubic sharper for the resize the halo could come from that, but if it was already there, then I dunno.

[Harold Davis]

i like the intimate setting as well. i would also remove the greenery between the beak and the bird's back and maybe even remove some on the left side down to the yellow leaf.

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the unusual composition and details. I agree on the halo around the bill and might tone down the whites a tad.

Florida? You miss at least 10 inches of snow today. :)