Black & White - White-backed Vulture

[Richard Flack]

Location: Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park
Black & White conversion
ISO 400
1/1250
5.6
Sharpened
(Something different - may not work - all comments etc welcome)

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hey Richard,
unusual for sure and I may be in the camp of not liking it due to crop. I think the tail being totally detailless is bothering me the most. What did you use to convert? I tend to like more details and tonal range in my B&W's....so might just be me. Let's see what others chime in.

[Diane Miller]

I agree with Roman -- I'd bet there is more detail to be found in the darks, so the tonalities aren't so flat. How did you convert? Nik Silver Efex can pull out a lot of detail, and possibly use Detail Extractor first if it doesn't get enough.

[Loi Nguyen]

Agreed that the tail lacks details, but for me the clipped wings is the main issue. Loi

[jack williamson]

I really want to like this and I think you are headed in the right direction, with a few tweaks to the B&W I think that this will work fine. Like Loi I wish to see the complete wings.

Jack

[shane shacaluga]

I too think the extended wings would have looked good in this image. Never worked with B&W so cannot really comment further. Thanks for sharing.

[Daniel Cadieux]

I'm OK with the cut wings, and the B&W works for the most part, but I agree with the others about the darks. For me it's the dark perch in front of the face that steals attention away from the subject.

[Gabriela Plesea]

Dear Richard,

I guess this is full frame, or almost full frame-am I right? I remember sitting in the car in the KTP for hours waiting for these majestic birds to take off. They preen themselves a lot and sit comfortable at the very top of a tree while the poor photographer keeps looking up and praying that the bird makes a move. One's neck gets sore from looking up, patience runs out and one starts fiddling with the camera and looking at the previous pictures. Then suddenly the bird takes off...When the subject flies off one realises the size of the wings exceeds expectations

You have a fine image here and the glint in the bird's eye is a big plus for me. I wonder if you have enough IQ to try a tighter crop? Just wondering if no wings might be better than half wings? Nevertheless, I like your B/W of this vulture and I thank you for sharing, this image brought some great memories, looking forward to more-please keep posting!

Kind regards,

[Gabriela Plesea]

...forgot to ask...what equipment are you using? Kindly specify when posting

Have a great evening,

[Richard Flack]

Thanks so much everyone. Really appreciate the comments. I love learning from you. (Gabriela, I was using a 7D with a 100 to 400mm lens, f5.6 for this shot.). I will share a couple of other photographs of this vulture, which include the wings. This was the more risky of the shots I kept, (I will also work on the tonality of my B&Ws going forward, thanks for the constructive comments)

[Richard Flack]

[Richard Flack]