African Fish Eagle fly-by

[gail bisson]

Taken in Botswana on the Okavengo Delta at 8:46AM
No baiting. he was perched in the reeds and flew towards us on the boat
Canon 1D MKIV
f 4.0 500mm HH
ISO 400
SS 1/2500
f 6.3
~ 75% full frame
Comments and critiques always appreciated and learned from with thanks,
Gail

[Nick Palmieri]

Great capture, love the wing position, the BG, and the how he is banking. The whites look hot on my monitor. Congrats on a cool capture!

[Bill Dix]

Terrific shot, Gail. I love the river environment, and the eagle's wing position is great. Whites may not technically be cooked, but at 253 in the red channel they give that impression. I wonder if a little more detail could be tweaked. In a perfect world I think I would like to see either both eyes for a head-on look, or a slight head turn away to see more of the bill. But the world ain't perfect and this is a fine shot.

[dankearl]

The environment is really nice, agree about the whites, should be an easy fix.
Even though the river is blurred, it gives a sense of movement.
I might consider bringing up the sharpness a tad on the water.

[Alan Murphy]

Good job holding the whites. Nice pose and comp.

[Marina Scarr]

Really like the pose and the angle here. Wonder if you might be able to eek out a little more details in the whites.

[John Cooper]

Very appealing flight pose Gail - I'm with Marina re a little more detail in the whites if possible.

[Shawn Zierman]

Nice strong flight pose. Great looking eagle! Excellent balance regarding composing the river
and the land. My only suggestion would be to crop out that sliver of sky coming into the frame
in the upper right hand corner, or blend it with the land, etc...

[gail bisson]

Thanks for the helpful advice. URC cloned in. Thanks for the sharp eyes Shawn.
I reworked the file- the hottest spot was 245 on the RAW so I selected the whites only and reduced the exposure by .10 then I took it into Color Efex detail extractor and used it on the whites at 20%. This brought out the detail but made it a bit grey so I then reduced the blacks using selective color in CS5.
The whites were then 237 to 240.
When I convert it to JPEG the whites get a bit hotter. Why is that?
Gail

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Gail, lovely birds in flight, and I like the angle and placement towards you. Colours look spot on, and the whites in your OP look fine too. I do like how the FE is separated from the BG.

I cant answer how the whites change from RAW to JPEG.

[David Salem]

Nice coming at you shot of this beautiful eagle. Great that you got a varied BG to give it a nice pop. Like the rich colors too. Not sure if the re-post made much difference on the whites but they are not to bad IMO. Well done.

[Arno Ellmer]

Terrific capture,Gail.The pose and wing position are superb.I love the down stroke of the wings and how the primaries are separated.The re working of the whites is great.
Also curious about the whites changing from RAW to JPEG.

[Satish Ranadive]

Gail:
Fabulous flight shot.Bird pops up beautifully against nice background.Love the wing position,colors and lights.

Regards,
Satish.