Little Blue Heron Juvi

I'm off to the Great Smokey Mountains National Park this Sunday. Thought I'd toss up a recent coastal image before the trip. Here's a shot of a very cooperative juvinile Little Blue Heron. I allowed my kayak to drift backwards in with the tidal current as I took images of this little guy. I usually find these birds to be quite shy, spooking into flight outside of preferred camera range. This one, however, was so close at times that I had to zoom out to frame the entire bird. What a wonderful problem to have. ;)

Canon 40D, Bigma @ 500mm, f/7.1, iso 1250, 1/320, ec +.33. Image crop represents about 80% of the original. Some distracting grass shoots cloned out above the bird's head. RAW conversion via ACR CS3, selective sharpening of the bird in PS + Shadows/Highlights adjustment and a slight S-curve adjustment. The sun was setting and things were getting quite dim. The sun position is camera right and slightly behind the bird.

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This one, however, was so close at times that I had to zoom out to frame the entire bird. What a wonderful problem to have.

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Oh, to be that lucky!!!

Beautiful image, Bob. I love the tilt of the head even though it's not an ideal HA. If his head had been cocked just a little higher and to the right it would have given a little more eye presence but this is still very nice. I am amazed that you got this image so nicely exposed with the sun setting - it looks like you did a very nice job there.

The one foot is a bit less in focus than would be ideal but I don't think any sharpening will help that. There are three darker areas in the bank behind him - you might look at cloning out all of them or at least the one directly parallel to his head.

I like the posture and energy in this image.

would adding black to the neutrals in the leg/foot (and base of the beak) help contrast it and make it appear more in focus?
if you lighten the black eye, greatly, might there be a catch light there??? then darken the rest again? The eye needs a sparkle.

Hi Bob- Nice to see this young one. Image conveys the hunting action quite well. The exposure looks really good. I like the way the greenish-yellow tones in the bird's skin are in the water too. Agree with Jules, don't think sharpening will help the one foot, which I think is blurred due to motion (?).

Thanks all. My thoughts on a few things mentioned:

The blurred foot doesn't bother me. Combined with the ripples in the water it conveys movement... which is exactly what it was.

Lack of a catch-light in the eye - As someone that makes a portion of their living shooting portraits I can assure you no one loves a good catch-light more than I. It would be very easy to paint one in. However, if the light is from the wrong direction it will not look natural. The uneducated viewer may not realize why something doesn't seem right with the image, but they'll know something doesn't feel right.

This is a beautiful image, Bob. I wouldn't change a thing.