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Thread: Little Bee-Eater

  1. #1
    Story Sequences Moderator and Wildlife Moderator Gabriela Plesea's Avatar
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    Default Little Bee-Eater

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    This image was taken in June 2012 in the Hluhluwe/Umfolozi Game Reserve. I am extremely grateful to my partner Andre who was so kind to wait patiently at the wheel while I took a great number of shots of this colorful pretty bird. My subject was perched at eye level a few meters away from the car, beyond Andre's reach. I had to shoot in the most uncomfortable position, camera hand held, bird behind us. Had we moved the car the Bee Eater would have flown away.

    My settings were:

    Nikon D3S
    Nikon 500mm F/4
    1.4 converter
    F7.1
    1/1250s
    Gabriela Plesea

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    Lifetime Member Stu Bowie's Avatar
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    Hi Gaby, a bee-eater that I dont have in my files - actually I dont have many bee-eater species in my files. Yep shooting from a car when one is all twisted inside out, isnt comfortable, but if you get the shot like this, its worth a bit of pain. Colours look spot on, love the leaning pose, and what a great eye. I do like that BG too.

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    BPN Member vishaljadhav's Avatar
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    Impressive looking portrait of a bee eater, super looking in colors, there are subtle change in colors on this bird and handled very nicely
    classic details and wonderful BG
    makes it amazing image, i like it

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    Lifetime Member gail bisson's Avatar
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    Great BG and a great portrait.
    I find the sharpening just a tad too sharp for my taste. (I am probably the only BPN'er who would say this!)
    I think this would have been even better had you been at F10 but am unsure as to what your ISO was and if you had the option to bump up the ISO or decrease the SS.
    Would love this portrait in my files,
    Gail

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    agree with Gail. When you are that close and bird is steady, better to stop down to f/8 and smaller.

    Great colors and well composed. Lots of impact. Must have been exciting...an opportunity to do headshots of such small birds does not around very often.Well done.

  7. #6
    Roman Kurywczak
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    Very nice portrait of a very small bird! I wish for a hint of head turn towards us.....but still a very nice image!

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    BPN Member Bill Dix's Avatar
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    Spectacular colors and beautiful comp. Worth the pain, as Stuart said (easy for us to say).

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    Super Moderator Daniel Cadieux's Avatar
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    Awesome colours and a well balanced portrait compositon and a nice uniform BG to make the subject pop. I agree a better head angle would have been nice, and I find the details coarse rather than fine...I know it is not a huge crop but that is the look the image has to me.

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    Super Moderator arash_hazeghi's Avatar
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    excellent light and colors it does have a big pop factor with those brilliant colors, I agree HA could be better.

    I don't think this image is lacking in DOF at all, but as Daniel mentioned details look coarse and a bit crunchy, most likely as a result of sharpening with a large radius.
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    The colors are very natural and the flat BG makes this a good image. It is not always possible but a a slight turn of the beak towards the camera would make this even better.

    Hiran

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    Beautiful portrait, great details and colors.

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  14. #12
    Story Sequences Moderator and Wildlife Moderator Gabriela Plesea's Avatar
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    Thank you all for your kind comments, I agree with Daniel about the coarseness of the image, it bothers me a great deal and I must do something about it. This image was processed last year and I was quite happy with it at the time, last night I took the edited version and resized it then sharpened the bird again and posted it. I shall look at the RAW and re-process, in the past I used to flatten my images and cannot look back to see what I did wrong. Should I manage to fix the problem, I will repost.

    Wishing everyone a great week-end,
    Gabriela Plesea

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    Wonderful head shot.
    Love the colors, wonderfu background, and great comp.
    Detail issue already mentioned.
    Very well done.

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    Beautiful portrait with beautiful colors,nice BG and composition.
    Rest is already mentioned above.

    Regards,
    Satish.

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