Double-Crested Cormorant

[Peter Seidel]

Double-crested cormorant. I believe this is a female. Shot with Nikon D700, and Sigma 50-500mm lens, handheld.

F/10, 1/800 sec., ISO 450, -0.3 exp comp. No flash. Shot at 500mm.

Processing note - when I first uploaded this it a few minutes ago it looked over-sharpened. I checked my LR settings and sharpness was set at the standard 25. This version is with sharpness (in LR) set to zero. It is a cropped image, but the edges (top of the birds's head) in the posted image still look a bit overdone.

Comments welcome,

Pete

[Jeff Dyck]

Very nice Peter - I particularly like the complimentary colours of the deep blue water and the saffron bill. Sharpeness looks fine to me at the this size. I might consider brightening up the green of the eye.

[Miguel Palaviccini]

I like the clean background and I agree with Jeff regarding the complimentary colors between the bill and water. Curious, how can you tell the difference between a male and female cormorant. I'm pretty new at birding - so I may be wrong - but I thought they did not display sexual morphism.

[Satish Ranadive]

Excellent portrait with very nice pose,colors and details.

Satish.

[Peter Seidel]

Thanks Jeff,

Appreciate the comments. I will be looking closer at that eye. This is still a work in progress. Overall I am pretty pleased with the sharpness, considering how much it's cropped. It just surprised me that it looked a bit over-sharpened when I first uploaded it. My favorite aspect are those colors. This was taken in late afternoon and so the blue in the water stayed a pretty deep shade.

Pete

Very nice Peter - I particularly like the complimentary colours of the deep blue water and the saffron bill. Sharpeness looks fine to me at the this size. I might consider brightening up the green of the eye.

[Peter Seidel]

Hi Miguel.

Thanks. Regarding my opinion that it's a female - it's not based on the coloring - it's based on the behavior of the other cormorants (all fully in black colored feathers) - based on how they were chasing (her) around, it appeared to be a group of males fighting over a single female.

Pete

I like the clean background and I agree with Jeff regarding the complimentary colors between the bill and water. Curious, how can you tell the difference between a male and female cormorant. I'm pretty new at birding - so I may be wrong - but I thought they did not display sexual morphism.

[Peter Seidel]

Thank you Satish.

Appreciate the comments.

Pete

Excellent portrait with very nice pose,colors and details.

Satish.

[christopher galeski]

very nice,can not add to any more that has already been said.well done.