House Finch

At least I think it's a House Finch. I've been playing with photography a lot longer than with birds... I was thinking it might be a Purple Finch but the recent post of one shows a whiter belly. I shot a female the other day, though, that was ID'd by several people as a Purple Finch, so I'm not sure. I think I have both.

Attracted to a staging perch next to my feeder, Canon 5D3, 300mm f/2.8 IS + 1.4X III, ISO 800, f/13, 1/160. Gitzo tripod with Wimberley II. Skating on thin ice with that SS, but was using flash and it hadn't recycled yet for this shot. I was surprised I was able to increase the underexposure well enough -- it was about -1.

Basic LR adjustments (mostly Exposure increase and Clarity) and a small amount of Detail Extractor. Some subtle BG cloning to conceal the "lines" of a couple of OOF branches. Some edge burning.

C&C always appreciated (along with ID!) I'm working on branches for a perch. The silly birds keep landing on their supports. (Yes -- I have Alan Murphy's e-books!)

Excellent Diane!
You have a nice perch, a nice BG and a sharp, well exposed Finch.
Very nice.

The colors looks nice and the Green BG compliments the red of the bird very nicely, the perch is good and the slight head turn makes it to a nice image

Good one

Magnificent image of finch on beautiful backdrop.
Love the colors,details,nice perch and composition.

Regards,
Satish.

Nice, and definately a house finch. Actually, I think the female you posted was a house finch as well. I've been comparing some of the female purple finches I have here, and they look a bit different. nice work.

Jim

Very nice solid image of a house finch.
You have a good HA and lovely BG.
I am quite surprised at the good IQ considering you raised the exposure so much. In my experience, doing that just introduces too much noise.
I am trying to figure out why you were at F13?
Gail

Looks very nice. The light looks even and the IQ is very good. Great work, Diane.

Lovely image, Diane. My favorite part of this image is actually the BG. It looks like part of a painting. The pose, details and colors are awesome. Great PP recovery here!

Beautiful portrait, great details and sharpness.

Very nice shot

It's a pleasing image, Diane. I like the background very much. Good PP work ! (I'd be thinking about how to adjust your settings to get more Shutter speed in the future...you'll miss alot at 1/160)

Thanks for the comments, and ID help.

Shutter speed: Although it hadn't recycled fully in this exposure, I was in the shade shooting with flash and my max sync speed is 1/180. I couldn't go to high speed sync because I was using a large plexi diffuser, about 2 ft square and 2 ft from the perch, with the flash 2 ft from the diffuser and set to a mid-wide zoom to cover the diffuser somewhat evenly. That necessitated the flash (also set to M) to be almost full power, which cut down too much light for high speed sync, thus the low shutter speed.

But I decided I didn't care for the large square catchight the diffuser gives, and then shot some without it. The flash is about 30 degrees to my left and, to my surprise, taking away the diffuser did not give noticeably harsher shadows. So I'll put the diffuser away and then I have enough flash power to go back to high speed sync with more shutter speed. But I really don't need high shutter speed with flash as the main light.

I'm on a very steady tripod with a Wimberley II head, have the camera braced tight against my forehead, and use the "silent" shutter mode which is claimed to cut down mirror slap. The only time I see an issue with movement is when the bird moves in the middle of an exposure. It would take a really fast shutter to stop that movement and would just freeze an awkward pose. But with the camera on M exposure (set for the sunlit trees in the BG) and the subject in the shade, the ambient exposure on the subject is 1 to 1.5 under, and most of the exposure comes from the flash which is running at something like 1/8000 sec at full power and more at reduced power.

Now, if I go to HSS it's another story. HSS fires a burst of very short (i.e. low power) flashes so the camera SS becomes more of a factor. I think it's probably a pretty even trade-off. And HSS might use batteries faster or cause shutdown from overheating sooner -- not really sure.

Noise: My camera exposure, on M, was only about a stop under the ambient light on the bird, but I was also surprised that I was able to bring up the exposure without too much noise. And I only had the default LR settings for noise -- no extra reduction, although the BG could probably use a little. Normally I just delete any underexposures. But at ISO 800 I have a little more leeway than if I had been at 1600.

Aperture: The small aperture was because, at this magnification, with the bird almost filling the frame on a full-frame sensor, I want all the DOF I can get. A few mm more makes a difference.

It's a balancing act -- you want something, you gotta give up something else.

Hi Diane, this is as good a pose you can capture, nicely angled, and near eye level too. Good pp work you recover the exposure as posted, and the colours on both the Finch and BG look good.