Superb Starling (Lamprotornis superbus)

[Martin Dunn]

Anyone who's travelled in Kenya will recognise this quite common bird. They always hang around picnic sites and anywhere they might find a few crumbs.
I was pleased to get a shot of this fella in a tree rather than on the ground. He was watching us ( ever hopeful) as we ate an al frexco breakfast at Elephenat Bedroom camp in Samburu.

Nikon D300s
Sigma 120-400mm lens @300mm
1/640
f5.6
ISO1600

Handheld

Minimal pp on this one. Just toned down the white of his eyes a bit.

[Steve Kaluski]

Indeed Martin, probably the most colourful of the Starling family.

For me Martin the image ultimately lacks IQ and it's mainly down to the high volume of noise in the image. For me this is surprising from a Nikon camera, however, is this a large crop or did you lighten the image at all, BKG, plumage...? Clarity & detail also appear to be lacking especially in the head and the eyes are soft, right eye as viewed just looks milky. A balancing act with ISO, DOF & SS, but I do feel that the DOF might have been better at around f/8 if possible and I would run some NR on the BKG. In an ideal world perhaps having the head either looking at you or getting a side profile may have been better, but there are better folks than me in Avian who can advise you more.

TFS
Steve

[Grace Scalzo]

Martin, Steve covered everything that I was going to mention. I'm wondering if you might have another in the series that would address Steve's comment about the eyes. Sometimes when something like that is pointed out to me, I go back to my files and find one that indeed is better.

[Martin Dunn]

Thanks for the comments Steve, Grace.
Apparently, the D300s does produce a lot of noise at higher ISO.

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Martin, a colourful starling indeed, and not one that I have seen in real life. The starling certainly seems inquisitive, waiting for you to throw a morsel his way. As Steve mentioned, a better HA would have been better - Im not sure how long he was around, but waiting and waiting with your eye stuck to the viewfinder, you are sure to capture more than one HA as he bobs about waiting for food. I realise its not always possible. I too, am seeing quite a bit of noise in the BG, and thought that the high end Nikons performed well with regards to noise. As posted, the BG noise is easily fixed.

[Satish Ranadive]

Wonderful colors on beautiful bird you have captured.Regards,Satish.

[arash_hazeghi]

nice colors, but the image is very noisy with lacking IQ, HA could be better (too much turned towards the camera) and overall a bit big in the frame


TFS