Summer Coat Whitetail

[jack williamson]

This buck is in his summer coat. Note the size of the bases of his antlers, he is going to have a large rack. Also note the scars on his body from fighting during the rut last winter. Taken at the St. Catherine Creek National Wildlife Refuge on the Mississippi River a couple of weeks ago. I had to downsize and lower the quality to get this one to fit the guidelines. D800, 300mm, 2X tc, tripod. 1/200, f7.1, ISO 800. Adjusted WB, EXP, cropped in ACR. Levels and USM in CS6.

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Jack, I find that deer can be rather fickle animals at times, they will either tolerate you or run a mile, so good to see got the shot and using a tripod.

Firstly and this purely personal, but I think it has some merit in being flipped. There is no real hard and fast rule, but IMHO it's how it looks as presented rather than I shot it that way so it has to be presented in that way, but... The grass does look rather bright and vibrant, if you upped the saturation I think it also has lost some of the detail. Tweaking the green does bring back some of the 'tonality' within the grass and texture/depth. I think you can also get a bit more tone & detail from the buck which again gives more 'form'. Using a tripod I think the techs look OK with a nice amount of DOF. The blade of grass being chewed and face to camera is a nice touch. I might be tempted to run a tad of NR to the BKG, however I am surprised at ISO800 with Nikon?

If you want me to RP my thoughts to illustrate the points above please let me know.

cheers
Steve

[jack williamson]

I think that I had gone too far with vibrance and warm WB on the OP. With this image I sharpened only the deer, I think the shimmering BG in the OP was a result of sharpening the oof detail of the grass and was not noise. Steve, always feel free to work on my images if you so desire. Thanks

Jack

[dankearl]

Steve brought up some things I never would have thought of and the repost is very nice, about perfect.
Funny how flipping it had such a nice effect.
Nice work Jack.

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Jack, this incorporates my thinking. All my comments & thoughts are always based on applying them to the image, which is then RP or binned ASAP. In that way I know it works and hopefully gives a better platform for feedback. Never sharpen globally as this will add artefacts. Compared to your RP my original thinking may be a tad red compared to the cooler 'blue' of the Nikon. All personal taste I guess, but you were there so have a better feel for the end result.

cheers
Steve

[jack williamson]

Thanks Steve, your repost shows the true color of the deer, I was close in the OP but ruined the grasses trying to get the deer the right color. Thanks Dan.

Jack

[John Ippolito]

Jack, I like the comp and the subject. Agree that is going to be a very handsome set of antlers with the heavy bases. Hopefully he got to this age by being smart enough to evade.

The flip is interesting and indeed the selective sharpening has cut what looked like noise. Steve's version really pops and looks very natural. Very nice. TFS

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Jack - Steve's suggestions (except for the flip, which he and I have debated before) does it for me. The colors look much more natural.

TFS,
Rachel

[Anette Mossbacher]

Hi Jack, the flip does really a change. Will keep Steve's suggestion in mind. The RP looks really great now.

Ciao
Anette