Bee-eater By The Beach

[Richard Mc Donald]

Finally the rain has stopped, the mornings cool and the days not so hot, it's my favourite time of year.

Crop is intentional, not only to show the Bee-eaters perch and dried seaweed but also to to give some definition to the "beach" theme.

It may not suit everyone's taste but we, at times, need to express ourselves outside of copy book formating. Personaly I like to see a fair bit of the subjects environment in a photo if possible.

CS6 - Neat Image - Color Efex Pro / Detail Extractor - NIK Sharpener RAW Presharpener / Output Sharpener with some light passes of Smart Sharpening.

(Many thanks to Arish Hazeghi for his Noise Reduction and Output Sharpening document).

Canon 1DMKIV - 800mm f/5.6L
ISO 400
F/8.0
1/2500sec
+2/3 EC
Evaluative Metering
50% crop

Richard

[Jonathan Ashton]

It works for me, I see the environment , the bird is central but to some extent I feel this is offset by the dry leaves/flower heads on the left.

[Ken Watkins]

This works for me as well, the inclusion of the environment in particular the seaweed makes this both interesting and different from the tight crops often seen.

[Derek Willcox]

richard a nice image like how you have included the surrounding nature i have yet to photograph one of these

[Jack Breakfast]

very sweet and i quite like the composition - centered birds but with a nice point of interest also on the left. i'd certainly lose the white border as it cuts into your presentation space!

[Daniel Cadieux]

The stuff at left and the long perch balance out the centered comp, but for me unfortunately I just don't find that stuff very appealing or pretty. I love the subject though with the beautiful colours and shape. TFS!