Directing Traffic

[Jeff Dyck]

I do love photographing Loons (or "Great Northern Divers" as our European friends call them - a more elegant name for this majestic bird IMHO). This is the male of a pair that have taken up residence on the Eagle River near my home in Dryden. I like the pose - it makes me think of a cop directing traffic - "Move along - nothing to see here..."

Yes - a little tight in the frame. This is minimally cropped - I lost quite a bit levelling the shot (getting shots level is one of the challenges of shooting from a kayak) - the left edge is the edge of the frame.

Canon 1DIV -- Canon 800mm F/5.6L IS -- 1/1000 @ f/5.6 -- ISO 400 -- Manual Exposure -- Kayak

[arash_hazeghi]

Excellent dynamic pose great details in both whites and blacks and very sharp.

[PhilCook]

hehehehe...good title....great light and action, tight down to the drops falling off the right wing

[Rachel Hollander]

Fitting title. Great pose, exp looks good and I agree with your self-assessment about a little tight in the frame. Really well done from the kayak.

TFS,
Rachel

[Melissa Groo]

Great action and congrats on such a nice shot from handholding that beast of a lens from a kayak! I struggle with that my 500mm! Excellent sharpness. A bit tight, yes. The lightness around the head makes me think of a sharpening halo though I don't think that is the case here. But I would perhaps try to bring the lightness just around the head down a little just to get rid of that illusion, if that makes sense.

[Bill Dix]

Wonderful pose, great detail. Yes, it's too tight, but fine image nonetheless. Good job on the exposure; whites are very bright but not clipped. I'd be scared to carry an 800 (if I had one) in a kayak, for fear I might lean over too far and flip the boat. Well done. I can see the halo effect that Melissa mentioned, which could be cloned out if you were so inclined.

[Marina Scarr]

Great pose and a lovely BG. Blacks look great. I would tone down everything but the blacks just a tad.

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Jeff, you have achieved a great angle shooting from your Kayak. Well timed for the wing flap, and just love the HA. Good to see the water falling off the left wing of the loon, and I agree with Marina to tone down the overall image.

[John Ippolito]

great angle, pose, and detail. Understanding that everyone has a different experience with monitors, I could also see toning down the highlights, or image overall. Excellent pose.

[rajojomanik]

You are a very brave man for taking that much gear on a kayak.

I was up at the lake last saturday and saw a total of 7 Loons but not very co-operative.

Wonderful pose, great details on the whites and nice low angle shot.

[Randy Stout]

Jeff:

Great pose. I would say about 75% of the many loon wing flaps I have seen, have been with their back towards me, so I appreciate the view!

Yes to the framing concern, but I don't mind it too much.

LIke the reeds in the BG.

Yes, I would look at the halo around the head.

Can you share what you did with the post work? In particular, did you need to do any recovery or toning down on the breast? I ask because it looks a bit more gray than I would expect based on the overall exposure. I have been there a few times!

Cheers

Randy

Are you still liking your new kayak? I have a lead on one, and like the hull design, and might give it a try for the bodies of water where I can't get my boat in.

[Jeff Dyck]

Thanks Randy.

Yes- I had to do some extensive recovery on the whites - while I was careful in the field not to blow any highlights, the contrast was just too high in the direct sunlight to process within Adobe's RAW converter with out a little extra jiggery-pokery. I actually ended up double processing the RAW file, then painting in the highlight details where required with a low opacity brush from the second conversion to make up the details I couldn't recover in the first pass conversion. The "halo" is just a natural feature of the background, but it would be easy enough to correct.

I am really happy with the kayak and it has seen lots of use in the past few weeks. The only downside I've found is that it doesn't handle very well in waves of any size - a combination of too much open space on the top and low gunwales causes lots of splash-over when the water gets rough (not that I photograph in those conditions, but it's good to know if you are buying a boat!). I have added a front skirt amd that does seem to help a lot. Carrying the boat any distance also isn't the easiest thing if you are by yourself (a common problem with most kayaks I've used), so I am looking at picking up a detachable, solo canoe portaging yoke to make carries easier when required.