Blue Jay, part II.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Same day, same setup, different individual (there are perhaps a dozen individuals at this location). Again, a similar technique was used in wedging shelled peanuts tightly inside crevices and holes to get the jays to stay on the perch longer as they work on dislodging them. I do wish for separation between tail and perch...

Canon 40D + 100-400 at 350mm, manual exposure, evaluative metering (exposure histogram checked), 1/250s., f/6.3, ISO 800. Some debris on the bill eliminated via patch tool.

[Joel Eade]

Hi Daniel,

I think this one is better than the previous posting, it seems better exposed, color more vivid and the sharpening is perfect.

Joel

[joel quenneville]

Daniel,
You have a great setup here, I love the perch and smooth BG. The blue jay also has an interesting pose. As the brightest part of the image, I feel that the tail is competing with the eye/face for my attention. I would suggest toning down the back/tail. The main source of illumination in your setup seems to come from the back. This works great with the perch and most of the bird by ginving it some countour and seperating them from the BG. However, this lighting is also responsible for the problem mentioned above. I would strongly reccomend a fill flash in this situation, it would brighten the bird's head and add a beautiful catclight. I like the placement of the bird in the frame as well as the head angle.

Joël

[Tom Rambaut]

I do like this photo.

Those colours on the wings are great, what a great looking bird. I like the soft colouring in this photo. Yes I can see that you could have seperation anxiety with the perch and tail.

[Humberto Ramos]

Great pose, and beautiful colors, the head angle is perfect and the BG is great.
In Portugal we have only the Eurasian Jay, but i still have not "catching" him...I just start wildlife and avian photography one year ago, and i'm still learning...
This Blue Jay is simply beautiful...

[Rohan Kamath]

Beautiful colors nicely exposed here. I especially loved the wings.
Nice critiques by Joel.


-Regards,
Rohan
__________________________________________________ _
Conservation begins at HOME... We CAN make a difference...

[Randy Stout]

Daniel:

You are really working the jays. For such loud and pugnacious birds, I find them a bit of a challenge to get them to stay on a perch or feeder. Are you using any sort of blind here?

Nice techs. I do appreciate the points Joel made, and would consider dodging the face and shoulder a bit.

I think one of the tricky bits about exposing blue jays is the the fact that a lot of them have light grey and not white on the breast (so called dark form) and it makes you think they are underexposed in those areas.

Cheers

Randy

[Daniel Cadieux]

I think one of the tricky bits about exposing blue jays is the the fact that a lot of them have light grey and not white on the breast (so called dark form) and it makes you think they are underexposed in those areas.


Thanks guys!

Randy, you are right about this. Some of the individuals at this spot are actually very grey on the belly and flanks - they almost look dirty.

[Nate Chappell]

Nice image Daniel, ideally I would like a little more dof for the tail considering it's facing us but you were fairly challenged for light. Nice comp and bg.