Greater Yellowlegs Fishing

[Melissa Groo]

Canon 5D Mark II
500mm + 1.4x
Handheld

ISO 640
1/5000 sec
f/5.6

A few days ago I drove up to Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge an hour away from where I live in upstate NY. Had heard of an American Avocet hanging out there and wanted so much to see it, a lifer for me. Didn't find it but did find this very active young greater yellowlegs running and wing flapping as it chased fish around. (I also got shots of it with fish, may post one in a day or two). I was fascinated by its feeding behavior, it almost reminded me of a reddish egret the way it ran around.
Sun a bit higher than I wanted. This was a pretty substantial crop. Wish I could have gotten closer but I wasn't allowed to move from my car, and this is the closest the bird came to me. Cropped at least 60% or so. Did some clean up of water/BG, lightened under the wings a bit, some sharpening, curves, and NR.
Would very much appreciate any thoughts on how I could improve it further.
Thanks in advance for any C & C.

[Mital Patel]

Melissa,
this is beautiful pose you have captured.

i see the image got burned a lot on white's.

Fingers on the wings shows heavy amount of noise. from water clarity i assume you might have open up mids and shades a lot.

give it pano look keeping bird in center of vert and it'll look good as to eliminate the extra open space on top.

[Cheryl Arena Molennor]

Love the pose and water colors. Looks a little over sharpened to me but most likely do to the large crop.

[Alan Murphy]

Great wing position. Whites look a little hot to me.

[Melissa Groo]

THanks guys. I'll try a linear burn on the whites when I have time later.

[Bob Pelkey]

Backing off on the crop would help the bird in part. More room on bottom and less on top would be more appealing to me. You may choose to consider keeping the wake of the water in the lower third of the image. Super handheld action shot.

[Melissa Groo]

Went back in and reprocessed it. Used linear burn, reduced the yellow, pulled back on sharpening, recropped per Bob's suggestion. Hoping it looks better.

[arash_hazeghi]

very nice pose and low angle, the IQ is not good however which is very surprising since the 5D2 can easily handle cropping and even sever underexposure at such low ISO.

[Melissa Groo]

I know Arash, that really surprised me too. Any thoughts on why that might be the case? Could it be something I'm doing in PP? Appreciate your input.

[arash_hazeghi]

I know Arash, that really surprised me too. Any thoughts on why that might be the case? Could it be something I'm doing in PP? Appreciate your input.

What are using to convert your RAW files?

[gail bisson]

The wing position is great but I agree that something is not right. The whites are a bit hot, as has been discussed and the IQ is not to your usual standard.. I am not crazy about the repost and prefer the OP. Would playing with the WB help and add a pop of blacks in selective coloring help?
Gail

[Melissa Groo]

very nice pose and low angle, the IQ is not good however which is very surprising since the 5D2 can easily handle cropping and even sever underexposure at such low ISO.

Arash, I just looked at my settings. What I normally do is make a couple minor adjustments to RAW in LR3, then I export to CS4 and work on the file with my preferences for editing in PS set at: ProPhoto RGB, 8 Bits, Res 300, PSD format. I just changed these to Adobe RGB1998, Tiff, and 16 Bit and have reposted. Does IQ look any better?

[arash_hazeghi]

Melissa,
the IQ will not change by changing the color space, for some reason the conversion output is very noisy and lacks fine detail. The older ACR was really poor in converting Canon RAWs, the new one has improved a bit but you need to fiddle with NR/sharpening settings to get it right. I don't use ACR so I don't know the best setting off the top of my head...


Here is an image taken with 5D2 at ISO 3200 for your reference


101420

Best

[Melissa Groo]

Oh man. That is a beauty of a shot. And I see what you mean. Amazing IQ at that ISO.
Yea, I am hoping that this was an isolated incident on the yellowlegs shot. There may be some trick to it in ACR but I don't quite know how to get at it. Will have a keen eye out for it in future shots with my 5DII though (which just came back from the NJ service center after a repair and cleaning). I appreciate your comments very much.
Again, gorgeous shot! You are really the BIF master.
Best,
M.