Little owl with attitude

[Mike Poole]

Trying out my new gear and I was invited to a fellow members Little Owl setup. I was originally going for a full vertical shot, but he jumped into an awkward and unflattering perch so I changed for a close up as he stared me out. Light conditions were not great and a bit of extra depth of field would have been beneficial but as I was just testing out my new 5d3 I didn't push the ISO far enough. Shot from a small portable hide

Canon 5d3, 500mm f4, ISO 1600 1/250th, f4.

Processed in LR5, slight brightening of the right (as we look) eye, selective sharpening and light NR

[Jonathan Ashton]

Nicely exposed, complementary background, I think there must be a good reason for no feet perhaps a wall or a log tree etc??
I would suggest a tad more sharpening.
(I am thrilled to bits, at 1.00pm today I found one 10 min walk from home)

[William Dickson]

Nice shot Mike, I love the eyes of the owl staring

[keith mitchell]

Mike understand what you say re dof ,but must say the head of the bird looks pretty good with perfect eyes.

Keith.

[John Robinson]

Interesting crop Mike and I reckon its a bit bright and could do with some USM. Perhaps the brightness making it look a bit soft.
Maybe my gear.
JohnR

[Norm Dulak]

Very nice, Mike. As Jon and John noted above, parts of the image are not especially sharp. But that would be expected for a 500mm lens at f/4. Considering that you were at ISO equivalent 1600 due to low available light, stopping the lens down further for greater DOF was not a realistic possibility. But I don't think that's a problem.

I find the owl's face and penetrating stare fascinating. Your point of focus captures that nicely, and it does not bother me that the breast and wings are soft. That only serves to emphasize that face.

If your file data permit, you might consider cropping this image even a little more tightly, taking some off the bottom and sides.

But I really like this as is. Thanks for sharing it with us.

[Jim Crosswell]

Nice image Mike. I like the eye contact, clean BG and image is sharp where it needs to be.

[Shawn Zierman]

Great eye contact...in fact it's hard to move beyond that it's so good. Nice soft even toned light quality. I really like Norm Dulak's crop suggestion.

[Iain Barker]

Hi Mike

I really like this. I don't mind the whole bird not being sharp as for me it helps draw my attention to those sharp eyes. As mentioned above once you look at the eyes its hard to stop looking at them.

TFS
Iain

[Mike Poole]

Thanks to everyone who has commented and offered a suggestion for improvement - all taken on board

Nicely exposed, complementary background, I think there must be a good reason for no feet perhaps a wall or a log tree etc??
I would suggest a tad more sharpening.
(I am thrilled to bits, at 1.00pm today I found one 10 min walk from home)

Jonathan, he had jumped onto a blue tin which is not flattering at all, so I decided to go for something different with the crop.

Great that you've located one, is it somewhere you can put up a hide and get some clear shots?

[Diane Miller]

Gorgeous -- maybe just a bit more midtone contrast, but soft light is what it is....