Green Heron on Limb

[WIlliam Maroldo]

SonyA700~Sony70-400G@400mm~ISO1250~F7.1~1/125 sec~manual exposure~tripod~6-10-2010~Brazos Bend State Park, Texas~CS4
Dim light. Sort of backlit, but not due to the usual causes. The setting sun was behind me, the bird in shade from trees also behind me, area further out on the water still lit and supplied backlighting.
comments and critique welcomed. regards~Bill

[Alfred Forns]

Good pose Bill and great bg !! Wish the bill was not lined up with the leg but would take it !! Overall density looks good and might want a little more texture on the head area !! ... btw could select the legs the desaturate a couple of points and darken a tad !!! ... take time and leave a couple of comments to others !!!! Like the image a lot !!

[Lance Peters]

Hi Bill - AL nailed the critique.
Like the pose and a couple of tweaks will improve - Like the BG, EXPOSURE LOOKS gOOD
tfs

[Harshad Barve]

Excellent image , spot on exposure and great advise above
TFS

[Rachel Hollander]

Nice image, interesting pose and I also like the bg.


TFS,
Rachel

[Ben Harris]

Great detail. Speaking as somebody who has shot Green Herons, getting texture on their wing is not the easiest thing. I like it a lot.

[Jackie Schuknecht]

Beautiful BG Bill and the beak and eye are razor shop. Al brings up a good point, but I'd take this any day. Might tone down the perch if it were mine.

[Peter Farrell]

Excellent image, Bill. Great detail and color on the bird. I agree about toning down the highlights in the legs and maybe the bright spot under the bill. I like that the talons are visisblr. How close were you, how big a crop is this?
Peter

[Ray Rozema]

Beautiful image Like the pose, Bg,especailly like that legs/feet are visible. I find the reflection/specular light in the top side of the pupil a little distracting.

TFS
Ray

[WIlliam Maroldo]

Thanks. Good points made. Highlight reduction certainly needed. Ray; I also noticed the specular highlights of the pupil , but only after I resized, converted to JPEG , and uploaded. Not difficult to fix. Thanks.
Peter: cropping was converting horizontal to vertical format, little cropping to height. I'd guess I was 15-20 feet away. I find that under very soft lighting conditions(low contrast) as was here, it is important to be as close as possible to capture details. The trade off for the exposure advantages in this type of light is that detail is never as crisp as in direct sunlight. regards~Bill