Nuthatch

[Jacqui Hendry]

I have been out in my garden this morning, and thought I would try using my flash as it was suggested in a recent posting that I made,

However I think that it may not have been an improvement as in my opinion it looks like I have lost detail in the feathers on the birds chest which is such a shame because I really like how you can see his tongue

Would this have been because of the Flash or perhaps maybe I was too close?

I was approximately 4- 5 meters away from him
using a 1DmkIII, 300f4, + 1.4 ext, f7.1, ISO500, 1/250,Flash set to ETTL, tripod AV mode

Thank you in advance for advice :-)

Jacqui

[Alfred Forns]

Hi Jacqui,

With birds at close distance the dof is minimal You did place the point of focus on the eye which is good That bird seems to be way overfed and has a large belly:D ..... difficult to have in focus even stopping down Cutting down on bird seed will give you better results :)

Framing wise I would have more room at the bottom for the virtual leg Imagine the leg (visible) then give it a little more room

The flash looks good Does not seem overpowering Normally you want to set it to -1 or even a little less Just want to fill Flash in no way interfere with the image

[Jacqui Hendry]

Over fed!!! :o

He is a greedy little bird, So if he loses a bit of weight are you saying I will then get more detail in the feathers on his tummy? :confused:

Jacqui

[Alfred Forns]

With that big belly I don't think it will all be in focus:)

Seriously try considering the amount of bird in front/back of the point of focus when you make your image Normally you don't want lots of things oof in front

Behind the image the oof things tend to go more "un-noticed' For example tail feathers Normally is impossible to have a bird facing you with enough dof to cover the tail

At the feeder the action can be hot so I would shoot and evaluate

.....btw keep feeding those little guys I'm sure they are appreciating your efforts:)

[Andrew McCullough]

I like pose with one foot up .

[Jacqui Hendry]

Thank you Al and Andrew for your comments and advice

Jacqui

[Rosl Roessner]

Hi Jacqui,
I like the pose of the nuthatch! They get very used to the feeding station and come closer and closer... nice guys!
I had to learn, that you have to wait 24 hrs. bevor you make a second posting.... I didn't see that rule before my posts, so I tell it to you....
Best regards,
Rose

[Emil Martinec]

You've got a lot of good advice. I am no expert on flash by any means, but I do find that if too strong it can wash out local contrast and feather details. To try to get some of that back, do some USM for local contrast enhancement -- large radius (say 50-80) and small amount (say 5-20), play with the amounts. Also try duplicating the image onto a separate layer, set the blending mode of the top layer to soft light or overlay and lower the opacity of that layer to suit.

[Jacqui Hendry]

Thank you Rose and Emil :-)

The Nuthatch does now come very close to me and he really is a great little character :-)

I hope to try again today but without the flash if the rain stops that is !

All the best

Jacqui