Love at First Nibble

[Arthur Morris]

This Macaroni Penguin preening its mate was photographed at Hercules Bay, South Georgia, with the tripod-mounted Canon 300mm f/2.8 L IS II lens, the 2X III teleconverter,and the EOS-1D Mark IV. ISO 400. Evaluative metering -2/3 stop: 1/200 sec. at f/10 in Manual mode. (Minor clean-up work.)

Most of the birds on my Southern Oceans trip were so tame that I rarely if ever felt limited with my longest effective telephoto length of "only" 780mm (300mm X 2 X 1.3). An upper left-hand sensor was chosen manully: AI Servo Rear Focus active at the moment of exposure. Click here (http://www.birdsasart-blog.com/2011/09/13/rear-focus-tutoria) if you missed the Rear Focus Tutorial.

To learn more about my great trip click here (http://www.birdsasart-blog.com/2012/01/26/home-from-the-southern-oceans-trip/) and here (http://www.birdsasart-blog.com/2012/01/27/st-andrews-bay-south-georgia-southern-ocean-voyage-best-day-ever/).

Don't be shy; all honest comments welcome.

[Karl Egressy]

Excellent details, great interaction, nice colours. The beak might need a little more sharpening.
I was wondering if the eye could go a bit brighter or it would look unnatural.
It is had to do any critique if you don't even know the bird and the lighting situations, as I don't.

[Arthur Morris]

Excellent details, great interaction, nice colours. The beak might need a little more sharpening. I was wondering if the eye could go a bit brighter or it would look unnatural. It is had to do any critique if you don't even know the bird and the lighting situations, as I don't.

Thanks Karl. Good advice on the beak. The eye has already been Eye-Doctored (lightened) quite a bit.... It was barely visible in the RAW file.

[Doug West]

Love the Macaroni yellow top. Did you get any of your extreme close ups of just
the yellow tops? That would be a killer image by itself.

[Arthur Morris]

Hey Doug, Great to see you here. What you are looking for would be near a near-impossible image; this was as close as I came to what you are looking for.

[Jim Crosswell]

Nice image Arthur! I like the intimate moment you captured here. Did you clone something out on the white area in the LLC? I think I see a repeating pattern there.Thanks Jim, I do not remember doing any cloning or QMs there. Here is the original; what are you seeing?

[Jim Crosswell]

On your OP you will see two small dark slashes directly in line with each other in the white area LLC. The patterns are exactly the same. In the original image you only have the upper mark and below it a darker patch with three vertical lines on a slight angle. I thought you might have cloned out those three lines. I hope you understand my explanation.

[Arthur Morris]

On your OP you will see two small dark slashes directly in line with each other in the white area LLC. The patterns are exactly the same. In the original image you only have the upper mark and below it a darker patch with three vertical lines on a slight angle. I believe you cloned out those three lines. I hope you understand my explanation.

Thanks. I think that I know what you are getting at. I recall using the Patch Tool or maybe a Quick Mask to replace some hot pixels....

[Jim Crosswell]

You are welcome and thanks for tweaking my Aracari image.

[Arthur Morris]

:S3: and YAW.

[Geir Jensen]

Another great penguin image. With so many great penguin pictures, it is difficult to do something different. You do it here. Oh I like that.:bg3:

[Jonathan Ashton]

An excellent intimate shot, I really like the detail and the behaviour portrayed.

[Chris Kotze]

Super close up and great feather detail, I like the close interaction