Female wood duck

[P-A. Fortin]

Finally, I did not have to go to San Diego or Ottawa to see a wood duck! There was a group of 8 (2 adults and 6 young) along with a couple of hooded mergansers (a first encounter for me). Sadly the mergansers never came close enough for me to get a decent shot.

The woodies however did. Actually, once again, a few individuals came within the MFD of my 400mm. It seems to happen every time I go out without my 100-400.

Canon 60D, 400mm @ f/5.6, 1/1000, ISO 500, no flash, handheld. Crop is about 65% of the original.

[Jeannean Ryman]

Very nice capture. I'm assuming the stripes running through the photo are refections of tree overhang? A bit distracting, but we can't always choose where they want to swim. Something about the color is a bit off to me. Maybe too much yellow or too much saturation? Might try a saturation reduction in the yellow channel to see what that looks like. I wish we had these ducks around here on a regular basis. (a couple who got lost *might* show up during migration). They sure are pretty!

[Bob Miller]

P.A. ...nice sharp shot of the woodie.....I still have not been lucky enough to spot one of these! because of the vertical overhang I might be tempted to add a texture! Nice work!

[Jeff Cashdollar]

P-A,

Nice one but as mentioned about the color seems to be off I will ask Kerry to comment he is really strong in this area.
Just curious do you have a color meter on your computer or do you calibrate the monitor?

[P-A. Fortin]

I do have a colormeter and used it to calibrate my monitor (spyder 3). I used the white area around the eye to adjust white balance.

The pound was indeed surrounded by trees in yellow fall colors.

[Kerry Perkins]

Hi P-A., I think what people are reacting to is the strong red/green of the reflections of the trees. Also, there is a slight red/green cast to the image overall. I took your image into LR4 and reduced the "yellow" saturation, which tones down the bg, then some color balance adjustments to bring the overall color into a more neutral place. Not a huge difference, but I think lowering the saturation of the water makes the bird stand out a bit more.

[P-A. Fortin]

Interesting.

But now I wonder: I understand that, depending on lighting, colors may shift and hence the need for white balance. Assuming that the image was correctly exposed originally, that lighting was constant over the scene, and that white balance was performed using the white area around the eye (which is as white as it gets, right?), how could this result in color casts in other areas of the image?

[Kerry Perkins]

P-A., it would be great if clicking on an "assumed white" area in your photo would make the color balance correct in the entire image, but that is not the case. It is preferred to find an area that should be gray (neutral). If you use a peak white area for your reference, there may not be much difference in the color channels, which will cause the software to derive a color balance which works for the whites but not for the neutral grays and shadows. I find it necessary to tweak the highlights, midtones, and shadows differently in PS for some images. IMO, Lightroom's global white balance does not always give the desired results, and you can get much closer in PS using your eye as a guide. I personally do not use any "auto" features of either LR or PS, and the white balance eyedropper in LR is definitely one of those. If you download the gray scale image that I posted as a sticky in this forum, then keep it open in PS while you work, you can easily see what "neutral" looks like. It is up to you to set the proper color balance for all the tones in your images. Notice that PS gives you color balance adjustments for highlights, midtones, and shadows. There is a reason for that.

[Dennis Bishop]

Good explanation, Kerry. Thank you.

[P-A. Fortin]

Indeed. All bow to master!

[Cathy McEntee]

Nice capture P-A! Kerry's toned down version does work better.