golden light little ringed plover

[christopher galeski]

took this shot this morning,was down my local river about 5am uk time,had to wait for sun to come up,but when it did ,managed to get a few shots off,at this little ringed plover.comments good or bad.thanks.cannon 7d,400mm prime lens,tripod,f6.3.1/1250,iso640.slight crop,levels,touch of sharpening.photo shop.

[Ofer Levy]

What a lovely image!!! Beautiful light, excellent techs and shooting angle, great eye contact. I love the habitat too. Just a minor thing would be to go to the RAW file and fix the slightly bright area on the cheek - nothig major...:w3
I can see some cloning spots in the BG and would remove the spot in front of the chest.

[noelle zaleski]

Very nice image Christopher, I have yet to get close enough to get a decent image of one of these.

I would also remove the orange pot on the rock next to his leg.

Very cute!

[Gary Esman]

Sweet shot. Love that eye and the feather detail...great job.

Gary.

[Tom Redd]

Very nice shot, I like the rocks and the lighting and BG are great. TFS

[Grace Scalzo]

The light is lovely, your early morning start really paid off. Great eye contact, and habitat. Do the clean up suggested and you've got a beauty here.

[Sidharth Kodikal]

Superb pose, light and setting! This image has a very lovely feel.
Just a minor point - I'd tone down the tiny bit of hot whites on the face.
Very nice image. TFS.

[Lorant Voros]

Very nice pose, light and detail. Love the low angle and the rocks that gives a good feeling of the environment. I agree with Ofer about the spot in front of the bird. The orange spot on the rock doesn't bother me too much. Well done.

Lorant

[Arthur Morris]

Loverly but looked overall too dark. Lightened the image, made all or most of the changes suggested above plus some additional rock clean-up and some Eye Doctor work. Ofer was correct; there were parts of the white cheek that were burned (beyond help of a Linear Burn so I cloned some texture in where needed).

Is the cheek over-exposed in the master file?

All as described in Digital Basics (https://store.birdsasart.com/shop/item.aspx?itemid=19).

[Ofer Levy]

I am not sure the repost is such a great improvement. I liked the soft low light of the original and the "doctored" eye looks un-natural. I usually don't like this practice of "doctoring" the eyes too much as it becomes funny looking and definitely un-natural. This is especially true in species like this plover in which the eye is dark and should stay that way IMHO.
BTW - the white patch on the cheek looks worse in the repost.

[christopher galeski]

thanks everybody for comments,Noelle,I dont know how I missed seeing the orange bits,Arthur,I have to agree with all Ofer's comments about your repost,I too prefer my original post,and also the changes Ofer,and Noelle suggested,but thanks for your input Arthur.thanks again everybody.