One more Crossbill

[Bill Dix]

From last week on the Jersey shore. By the time I saw him the light was overhead and far from ideal; resorted to some s/h, burning and dodging to try and bring the face out of shadow. Also had to crop tightly to eliminate his mate who was perched on the underside of the cone cluster (talons show at the bottom of the image), since there was an oof branch blocking a good view of her. Still, I was glad to get this new species, rare in our parts.

D90 | 500f4 + 1.4X | ISO 800 | 1/800s @ f/6.3 | +0.3 EV | monopod

[Terry Olmsted]

A great capture, Bill! And a perfect pose/perch. Wonderful detail and color, although it appears
on the edge of being oversharpened on my monitor. I may be the only one that prefers just a
bit softer image - so take my comment with a grain of salt. Wonderful job, in any case!
Terry

[Gary Hamilton]

Very nice image, Bill. My favorite of the series. You did a good really good job with the head/face. I think you can get rid of his mate's talons fairly easily in PS. I took the liberty (with my limited PS skills) of having a go at it with the patch tool. It was a quick and dirty effort but perhaps someone with better PS talent can show you another/better way of doing it.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Bill, this was a tough one and I find that it shows a bit here. That extra piece extending in front of the face is distracting, and the head is angled away. I would also crop a bit more at bottom (about halfway across your signature) so the cone would be cut right at the tip, thus giving it a larger base to anchor it on the bottom edge. The catchlight is a bit odd too IMO and I wouldn't expect it to come from a lower light source.

You did get some good chances at nicely documenting this local rarity. I love how big the toes look like as the claw the cone, and the colours look good.

[Dan Brown]

I agree with Daniel. The removal of the talon should be easy. I also see some serious jpeg artifacts in the upper left corner of the frame in the blue sky. But, I would still love to have this in my files!!!

[Bill Dix]

Thank you all for looking, and for the helpful comments.

I agree that the talons can easily be removed.

The vertical stem would also be an easy removal. I debated this: whether I liked the tension that it provided more than I disliked its distraction. I went for the tension.

Daniel, I like your cropping suggestion to widen the base.

The catchlight bothered me also. It appears, more faintly, in the RAW file. I wonder if it is a faint reflection of the snow-covered ground? I probably exacerbated it when I dodged the face area.

Dan, I hadn't noticed the jpeg artifacts but can see them when pointed out. Worse, of course, in the repost. Possible the result of a large crop?