Bosque Cranes Coming in for a Landing

[Hany Aziz]

Another image from Bosque from today (Sunday) morning. Camera: Olympus E5 with Olympus 300 mm f2.8 lens with a 2X TC. Aperture F5.6 and shutter speed of 1/640 sec. ISO was 200.

I am fairly happy with the composition but feel that it lacks some sharpness and overall "pop" despite some post-processing. Image is uncropped.

Critique and input welcome.

Thanks.

Sincerely,

Hany.

[Tim Munsey]

Great trio formation flight shot, looks overexposed on my work monitor.

Tim

[Bill Dix]

Great composition, but I agree it looks overexposed; harsh light didn't do you any favors.

[Doug Brown]

You captured the habitat nicely, but your exposure is definitely off (probably by a good 1 1/3 stops). Birds feel a little tight in the frame, and I wish that there was a clear subject. Hope you had a nice time at the Bosque!

[David Gancarz]

Agree with previous comments. The overall scene dynamic range to just too much. The whites are washed out to sacrifice the shadows. Flash fill with a Fresnel lens? Long range flash fill is new to me, but I'm eager to give it a try. I hope to meet you one day at one of these wonderful locales.

[Myer Bornstein]

Hany

was nice meeting you. I agree with all the above, the whites are blown. I tried Tim Grey's dodge and burn that Artie told us about and still could not recover the whites

[Hany Aziz]

You captured the habitat nicely, but your exposure is definitely off (probably by a good 1 1/3 stops). Birds feel a little tight in the frame, and I wish that there was a clear subject. Hope you had a nice time at the Bosque!

Good guess! Exposure compensation was +1 1/3 with no blown highlights (as best as I can tell from the Olympus software and the histograms, since Lightroom will not open the RAW files since the SLR body is very new). I was following Artie's general advice to add exposure without blowing the highlights. I have adjusted the highlights and shadows in post-processing but have not made a post-facto exposure correction in Lightroom, Apple Aperture or Photoshop. When I did try briefly in Apple Aperture the image just turned a bit muddy. Will try again. BTW no flash was used with that image.

Thanks.

Sincerely,

Hany.

[Hany Aziz]

Quick reprocessing in Olympus Viewer; "exposure" pulled back one stop in Olympus Viewer then a resize in Lightroom.

Thanks.

Sincerely,

Hany.

[Dan Avelon]

this one doesn't work, birds are way too soft and merging, shadows don't help either.

[Doug Brown]

The repost does a nice job of bringing the whites back. I'm not sure what you gain by pushing the exposure to the right on a bird such as a Sandhill Crane that doesn't have any deep black in its plumage. All you are getting is too-bright whites and a slower shutter speed.