Preening ballet dancer

[Clemens Vanderwerf]

This image was created in the morning at 8:29am at Estero Lagoon in Fort Myers Beach, Florida during the SW Florida IPT of Arthur Morris. This reddish egret was playing hard to get but eventually settled for a preening session in the main tidal pool. By going flat on the belly in the mud I was able to create a pleasing background with maximum focus on this beautiful bird.

This image was created with the Canon 800mm f/5.6L IS lens at 800mm, and the EOS-1DMIV. ISO 800. Evaluative metering: 1/800 sec. at f/5.6 set manually.

All comments are welcome.

Thanks for looking.

[jack williamson]

Awesome exposure, pose, and detail. The bg is lovely but seems to be a little too much oof fg. Beautiful.

Jack

[Steven Kersting]

I really like this picture, but I would have framed/edited it more like this:

http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=108873&d=1329365804
Removed from bottom, added to top, cropped centered.

[arash_hazeghi]

nice pose an details I like the original composition as it is not dead center with room for virtual feet.

[Dave Leroy]

Nice pose and I really like the soft muted colors and spiky feathers. It does seem to be a photo offering different crop suggestions and may look nice as a tight vertical as well. Opening post is fine for me.

[Morkel Erasmus]

Lovely soft light, crisp detail and good framing here Clemens. Low angle rocks!

[Randy Stout]

Clemens:


Excellent shooting angle, exposure and sharpness. I would consider cropping up about 1/3 of the free space form below, as mentioned.

The contrast on the bird is perhaps a bit more than I remember him presenting. These guys usually look a bit softer.

Good to talk with you again!

Cheers

Randy

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Clemens, terrific pose and low angle is of course perfect for this situation. love the smooth clean BG your guys get with the long lens. agree that some crop from bottom will improve the balance.

[Cheryl Arena Molennor]

Super low angle creating that dreamy effect that I love. Nice pose and detail. I agree about the taking off some oof foreground.

[gail bisson]

I loved this" In camera" and still do now. I am OK with the composition but think that a crop from the bottom would be good as well. I love the detail on the legs. The pose with the visible eye is great. I wonder if there is a touch too much contrast?
Gail

[Robert Holguin]

Wow. Beautiful image. Love the low angle, excellent pose, and the feather detail is excellent.
Very well done.

[Arthur Morris]

I love the high key look and the low perspective. I would have tucked the bird in the upper left corner as in the repost. See my head angle comment's on Gail Bisson's preening tern :).

[Arthur Morris]

I loved this" In camera" and still do now. I am OK with the composition but think that a crop from the bottom would be good as well. I love the detail on the legs. The pose with the visible eye is great. I wonder if there is a touch too much contrast? Gail

I think that what you are seeing as too much contrast might be too much Structure in Viveza.... Whenever we get new toys we tend to over-do things for a while....