Greater spotted Woodpecker

[Mark Corpe]

This male GSW regularly visits my garden in search of food. This shot was taken 3 days ago in less than ideal conditions (low light, overcast, raining) meaning I had to use ISO 8000 to get my shutter speed up to a reasonable level to avoid motion blur. Processed as well as I'm currently able to reduce noise whilst retaining what detail there is in the shot. Comments and critique welcome
The stats are as follows:

Camera: Canon 1D mk IV tripod mounted
Lens: Canon 400mm f/5.6
Aperture: f/5.6
Shutter speed: 1/400 sec
ISO: 8000
EC: +1/3
Metering: spot
Subject distance: approx 7 metres

[Randy Stout]

Mark:

Considering the ISO needed, I think the image held up pretty well. Wish he was turned towards us a bit. Like the soft BG, good grip displayed, well scaled perch, few rain streaks with drip on bottom of perch on the right.

Could you share your post processing tech, how you handled the noise esp., since now that many of us are in the dark months, we need all the tricks we can to keep shooting!

Cheers

Randy

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Mark, agree that the IQ looks good for that ISO. Was NR applied on the bird? If so, might want to back off and see if you get more sharp details.