Magellanic Oystercatcher Displaying

[Arthur Morris]

This Magellenic Oystercatcher image was created on my recent trip to Chilean Patagonia. I used the Gitzo 3532 LS carbon fiber tripod, the Mongoose M3.6 head, the Canon EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM lens, the Canon 2x EF Extender III (Teleconverter), and the Canon EOS-1D X. ISO 800. Evaluative metering +1 stop as framed: 1/500 sec. at f/10 in Manual mode.

Central sensor (by necessity) Expand/AI Servo Rear Focus AF one inch behind the eye active at the moment of exposure. Click here to see the latest version of the Rear Focus Tutorial. Click on the image to see a larger version.

See more images from the steppe lakein "Fun on the Mudflats: here.

Don't be shy; all comments are welcome.

[Mervyn Marsh]

Hi, very cool photo, one of my fab birds, I like how they creep along the beech.. In Australia their eye is the same color as the beak a dark orange. The hardest thing I find about pp with their photos is the noise In the blacks? did you add much noise reduction? nice work :)
Cheers,
Merv

[Randy Stout]

Artie:
The line of shells or crust(?) across the image adds a lot to the featureless background and makes it look almost like he is gingerly walking along a prickly path.

Nicely exposed with good detail in the blacks, interesting pose.

It makes you look twice to see what is going on.

Cheers

Randy

[Enrique Patino]

Great detail in blacks Artie. Was it taken under overcast conditions? Next time you go to South America and (if you) need an interpreter, let me know...

[Grace Scalzo]

Love everything about this image, Artie...lucious blacks, great pose and interesting habitat. Want to know more about the line of stuff...shells?

[Marina Scarr]

Love the behavior captured here, esp the raised tail along with the lowered head. The line of shells works nicely and helps to bring the viewer through the image from left to right.

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Artie, love the 'gentle' pose with the raised foot, and raised tail. You certainly nailed the exposure - great blacks, and the OC pops really well from the lighter BG.

[Emanuel Tiberi]

Arthur, the black details look great and I agree that the shells'd help a lot in the general composition.




PS: They do that when they feel threatened (at least that's what I'd observed every time I tried to take a picture to them)

[vishaljadhav]

WOnderful image Bhai, the raised foot and the raised tail catches the eye
Super exposure on the blacks, lovely low perspective

[Morkel Erasmus]

Lovely angle, exposure and pose Artie.
Does it need the slightest rotation?

[Sandy Witvoet]

Beautiful detail... great pose, detail and color, love the fg AND bg... I believe (and agree) with Morkel, just a teeny bit of CW rotation. Would love to see one of these someday!

[Gary Kinard]

Wow, beautiful bird and shot.

[Arthur Morris]

Arthur, the black details look great and I agree that the shells'd help a lot in the general composition.
PS: They do that when they feel threatened (at least that's what I'd observed every time I tried to take a picture to them)

Thanks Emanuel. This is in no way a threat display of any kind--when they do this they are showing off to the ladies...

[Arthur Morris]

Hi, very cool photo, one of my fab birds, I like how they creep along the beech.. In Australia their eye is the same color as the beak a dark orange. The hardest thing I find about pp with their photos is the noise In the blacks? did you add much noise reduction? nice work :) Cheers, Merv

No actual NR except during conversion in DPP. I think that I ran a Surface Blur on the bird only to smooth things out.... As detailed in my Digital Basics File, an instructional PDF that is sent via e-mail. It includes my complete digital workflow, dozens of great Photoshop tips, several different ways to expand canvas, all of my time-saving Keyboard Shortcuts, Quick Masking, Layer Masking, and NIK Color Efex Pro basics, image clean-up techniques, Digital Eye Doctor, and tons more.

[Emanuel Tiberi]

Thanks Emanuel. This is in no way a threat display of any kind--when they do this they are showing off to the ladies...

My mistake . I got confused with the following pose (fighting with a Southern Lapwing)




Sorry for the hijack

[shane shacaluga]

Lovely low angle Artie and great details on the blacks.

Like the smooth foreground and background and the lifted dry clay where the bird is

Was it a patch of lifted clay and the rest smooth or did you do any work cleaning up the smooth areas?

I suppose it was pretty close and why you chose to use f10

Thanks for sharing!

Will re-read the Digital Basics as cannot remember the Surface Blur section ;)

[Girish Prahalad]

great low angle & walking pose. the blacks & IQ look great. like the comp very much.

[Arthur Morris]

Artie:
The line of shells or crust(?) across the image adds a lot to the featureless background and makes it look almost like he is gingerly walking along a prickly path.

Nicely exposed with good detail in the blacks, interesting pose.

It makes you look twice to see what is going on.

Cheers

Randy

Thanks Randy. Looks like shells but actually peeling mud crust.

[Arthur Morris]

Lovely low angle Artie and great details on the blacks.

Like the smooth foreground and background and the lifted dry clay where the bird is

Was it a patch of lifted clay and the rest smooth or did you do any work cleaning up the smooth areas?

I suppose it was pretty close and why you chose to use f10

Thanks for sharing!

Will re-read the Digital Basics as cannot remember the Surface Blur section ;)

I think that Surface Blur was in the last update but I could be wrong. Thanks for your purchase. As you can see by the JPEG that represents the original capture, I did some foreground clean-up.

[Arthur Morris]

My mistake . I got confused with the following pose (fighting with a Southern Lapwing) Sorry for the hijack

No problema. Thanks for sharing. Those lapwings start up with everything and anything.

[Arthur Morris]

Thanks all for your kind comments. It does look as if it could use a fraction of 1 degree CW rotation.... Good eyes guys!