Black Headed Gull landing

[Iain Barker]

I'm not sure about this one due the the IQ not being the best but liked the composition so thought I would post it for ideas on how it can be improved.

Nikon D7000, 300mm F4 AF; 1/1000 f5.6 iso400, manual metering;

Raw edited in Lightroom, Crop slight exposure, clarity and curves adjustments and some selective sharpening to the gull and branch.

[Randall Farhy]

Iain, I love the composition on this one. Had to resort to one of my Topaz adjustment pre-sets as the start point then to LR5 for myriad tweaks and adjustment brushes-but you get the idea-I just couldn't back out the sharps you already applied so there are halo artifacts. I'd say there is potential to save it within the RAW, and this would make an awesome OOB project for someone with less rigid creativity. Might be a bit of a green cast, and the branch still needs some TLC.

Edit-Pic updated. I must have hit the exposure slider by mistake on the first image, it was a little dark.

[Steve Kaluski]

Iain, based on the OP, taking it back into LR, adjusting slightly the Highlights & Whites will be enough, then opening up the Shadow slider for the log, the shadow areas need lifting. Anything more and you will start to lose some of the minimal tone, plus I like a bit of tone in the BKG, otherwise it looks too stark. Has and retains a look of being very overcast day?

[Iain Barker]

Thanks Randall and Steve, I will go back to the raw file and make some further adjustments.
It was an overcast morning that was just starting to brighten up. The background is a lake and must have been reflecting the grey sky. I quite liked the monochrome feel this gave to the image.

[Diane Miller]

Very nice catch, although the bird does appear soft. Maybe focus wasn't following it fast enough, or had jumped to the branch -- I don't know that camera. Randall and Steve gave you the needed corrections. Not much you can do for that degree of softness, unfortunately. Keep working on technique!

[Iain Barker]

I have played around with the highlights, lights and shadows in this repost. I also added a bit of smart sharpen to the bird and perch in Photoshop before final export.
I think it has lifted the image from my OP. As Diane said it is a little soft as I think the focus was just off so sharpening will only do so much. I do have anther similar image with better IQ which I may post over the weekend.

[Diane Miller]

Looks nice! I would go for a little more lightening of the perch, just to keep it from competing with the gorgeous bird, but that's a personal decision.

[Randall Farhy]

Looking pretty good there Iain-Along with Diane's suggestion, you could try bumping exposure a touch and using a desaturation brush on the breast area of the bird to reduce the reddish cast which looks like noise, though it might be a reflected cast from the legs and bill. I don't think lightening a touch will hurt the BG tones too much, even though it's overcast on a lake, it reads as fog which is a pretty cool effect. There's also a color fringe on the edge of the log which is easy to deal with in LR, just adjust the slider (after using the dropper) so as not to wipe out the color on the legs.