Osprey Courtship Display with Fish

http://www.flightschoolphotography.com/POST/LW3.jpg
Indian River County, FL - 1D3, 500mm+1.4xTC, hand held from boat, 1/3200, F7.1, ISO 800, manual exposure

This image was made on January 5th while I was out in my boat with Artie, Joe Van Os, Wayne Lynch, and Wayne's wife Aubrey. It was great being out with such a famous group. :)

The Osprey would fly straight up holding his fish out for all to see and screaming constantly. Then he would turn over and dive straight down, still screaming. This flight pattern would be repeated several times. It seemed to do a good job of impressing the other Ospreys.

Splendid pose and perspective. I would like to see his left eye brought out more.

What an amazing image! I, too, would love to see more detail in the darker eye. I also wish I could make out the eye on the fish just a bit better. The wing span is gorgeous, even with the shadows I still think it's wonderful. The bird adds great scale to the size of this bird and that awesome wing span.

Excellent pose, I' sure he attracted a lot of attention. I see a lot of artifacts or noise in the sky.

Love this pose, Jim. I miss going out on your boat.
I agree with Fabs about the noise. Noise Ninja on the BG would take care of this, but I know how you dislike a lot of post-processing. I really don't care about the darker eye. In reality, there are such things as shadows.

Jimbo,
The eye contact and symmetry of the image really makes this work.
The fish is a tasty bonus.
Noise has been covered. But why the noise?
Let me guess, the action happened so fast you did not have time to open up 2/3 to 1 stop for a subject directly over head. Or protecting the whites resulted in a underexposed sky?

Nice to see you, Doug and David(he promised to post an image)last week.

Be well,
Jimbo

Quote:

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Originally Posted by James Shadle

Jimbo,
The eye contact and symmetry of the image really makes this work.
The fish is a tasty bonus.
Noise has been covered. But why the noise?
Let me guess, the action happened so fast you did not have time to open up 2/3 to 1 stop for a subject directly over head. Or protecting the whites resulted in a underexposed sky?

Nice to see you, Doug and David(he promised to post an image)last week.

Be well,
Jimbo

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The sky was intentionaly underexposed, a sacrifice to preserve the whites. The image was made at about 3:45 on a sunny afternoon. The bird was not directly overhead. The bird is actualy verticle, flying up with his tail straight down. I also have the next part of the courtship with the bird inverted and flying down still holding the fish out and screaming. The angle of the bird in relation to myself and the sun resulted in almost direct lighting. The bird was properly exposed with the whites on the edge, but not over.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jim Neiger

The sky was intentionaly underexposed, a sacrifice to preserve the whites. The image was made at about 3:45 on a sunny afternoon. The bird was not directly overhead. The bird is actualy verticle, flying up with his tail straight down. I also have the next part of the courtship with the bird inverted and flying down still holding the fish out and screaming. The angle of the bird in relation to myself and the sun resulted in almost direct lighting. The bird was properly exposed with the whites on the edge, but not over.

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Underexposing does not explain the noise unless it was brought up in post processing. You could run Noise Ninja just on the sky.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Fabs Forns

Underexposing does not explain the noise unless it was brought up in post processing. You could run Noise Ninja just on the sky.

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The RAW file contains the noise when I look at the actual image in BBPro. Here is the image with the noise fixed:
http://www.flightschoolphotography.com/POST/LW3b.jpg

Way better!
I figured the exposure issue was one or the other. And you did they only thig you could do.
See you soon.
James