Black-fronted Dotterel

[Leo Berzins]

A Black-fronted Dotterel at the Jerrabomberra Wetlands in Canberra, Australia.

Canon 50D, 400f/5.6L, 1/2500s, f/5.6, ISO 400, manual exposure, Mongoose 3.6 mounted on a skimmer
full frame

[Arthur Morris]

Wicked bird, neat image design. Good head angle. Looks a bit too bright/contrasty from here....

[Faraaz Abdool]

Excellent image, although it looks like the light was harsh. Good job on this little bird.

[Karl Egressy]

Nice low angle image, ecellent HA. The light looks harsh as it was mentioned earlier.

[Jon Swanson]

Great details, control of whites considering the BG, and bird! Well done!

[Daniel Cadieux]

I agree with the harsh / contrasty light but I like the subject. Neat red eyering and bill. Good details and comp.

[PhilCook]

Well done getting close to these wary little birds, liking the side on profile. Light is a tad harsh but considering the open habitat and harsh Australian light it's acceptable imo. Detail is great Leo, pleasing shot of these sweet little birds

[Arthur Morris]

Ran a reverse S curve to lower contrast. Linear Burn and NIK Detail Extractor on WHITEs. A bit of bill and beach clean-up. All as described in Digital Basics. See next pane for reverse S curve.

[Arthur Morris]

I save a Curve like this in the presets and title it "Reduced Contrast." It's great for harsh light images....

[Leo Berzins]

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions. It is mid-summer here and the sun had been up for an hour and a half by the time I got this image so I guess the light was getting a bit harsh, as indicated by the exposure settings.

Thanks heaps Artie for taking the time to reprocess the image. The reverse-S curve has noticably tamed the contrast and the NIK Detail Extractor has revealed some more detail in the whites.
I have received my Digital Basics update overnight (thanks Jim) and will go through it in the next day or two. I don't have NIK yet but I will get it after seeing its effectiveness here and on your blog.

[Arthur Morris]

You are welcome Leo. I meant to mention that there might be a problem with some of the WHITE areas. The RGB #s looked OK but they looked very bright without much details. You might wish to start from scratch and try to convert so that there are no RGB values above 230 or 235 in the WHITEs....

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Leo, good low angle of capture, and you have brought out he plumage nicely - sharp too. This species looks like our three banded plover. I like what Artie did to reduce the contrast.