Tricolored Heron on the Hunt

[gail bisson]

Taken in February at Bunche Beach.
Canon 1DX
600mm v II, 1.4XIII
ISO 400 SS 1/2000 f 5.6
PP: Small crop, LR5 sliders : clarity +13 vibrance +13 saturation +8 whites +5, blacks -9, then off to CS5 for NR on BG, levels and DE at 1% on bird only and tonal contrast on BG only at -50 for shadows and midtones. This helps smooth out the BG nicely from all subtle imperfections. USM to JPEG at 15%
Comments and critiques always appreciated and learned from with thanks,
Gail

[Jonathan Ashton]

Beautiful a lower angle might help - no only kidding! Timing is excellent as are the details. I recognise you apply NR to the background and I suspect this is your personal preference which od course is fine, but I wonder what it would look like without.

[gail bisson]

Hi jonathan,
Here is the file out of LR5 with no NR or (negative) tonal contrast to the BG.
Gail

[Tim Harding]

Love this image. The dappled sunlight/reflections on the bird make it look like it's wrapped in plastic wrap! Beautifully exposed and processed as usual.

Do you have particular USM settings you use as a guideline?

[Karl Egressy]

Excellent low shooting angle, nice head turn and eye contact, Gail. The light is great.

[Jonathan Ashton]

Thanks for the second post Gail, it is good to see the difference. I like the negative tonal contrast it is quite gentle but effective. I am a little easy come easy go regarding the NR, - but I think I would omit it.

[William Dickson]

Lovely image. I like the original post it looks so cool. Great details and sharpness on the bird. I love the foot trailing on the water and the POV Well done Gail and thanks for sharing

Will

[Jim Crosswell]

Excellent image Gail! I like the low angle, running pose, water trailing off the leg, IQ, details and composition.

[steve torna]

I think that this is a very beautiful and elegant image that seems to capture the essence of a heron. The light and colors are soft and delicate like pastel to my eye. It's remarkable that the colors and hues of the background and the heron are so similar and complimentary. I appreciate the context and I consider this image as artistic, I would hang this in my home.

[Sidharth Kodikal]

Great low angle and light is truly special here. The pose is very nice too and as is the HA. I'd move the bird further into the frame a bit, not much. Lovely image Gail

[Frank Schauf]

Great light and work.

[Shawn Zierman]

Classy image with many bells and whistles. Great low angle work and the subject movement, head angle, rich tones, and composition all just rip!

[Doug Brown]

Love the low angle and great color. The raised foot is a nice bonus. Why boost both vibrance and saturation? I don't use vibrance at all (unless I'm photographing people).

[Geoffrey Montagu]

Wonderful hunting image, Gail. I agree with the NR on BG, but in your repost I personally prefer the subtle softer color. I think by virtue of just sharpening the bird you'll add the slightest color contrast IMO.

Geoffrey

[Grace Scalzo]

A pretty great image. Love the color palette and that raised foot. Processing is personal taste, but the repost to me is slighly more natural looking.

[David Salem]

I always say it's all about the light, and the light is killer here. Perfectly lined up with the sun at your back. This has a great 3-D effect and I love the intense pose with the raised foot. Great work Gail

[Girish Prahalad]

lovely light & low angle. the pose & IQ are excellent.

[Ritesh Nangare]

Great Light here. awesome details,BG, The water level just kill me awesome framing. i like the first image.

[gail bisson]

Thank you all for your comments. very much appreciated.
Tim H- Re: your question about USM. When I first started out in bird photography I used Artie's Digital basics guide as my bible. Once I got more confident and i started using Detail Extractor ( a plug- in for LR and Photoshop) within EFEX Pro I realized that this sharpened the TIFF significantly. When I converted to the JPEG I found that I could back off a lot in the % of sharpening. I use radius of 0.3 for images sized at 1200 x 1000 ( the BPN size). I now judge every image on its own merits and use whatever % I think I need. A bit tedious but worth it IMHO.
Doug- As you know, vibrance saturates the midtone colors of the image unlike saturation which increases all tones. As you say, it works great when taking people pictures and skin tones. Again, depending on the image I will play with the vibrance and saturation till I get the colors I like. It is often such a subtle difference that, when I revisit an image, often I can't even tell for myself what the difference is!! There are lots of times I don't touch the vibrance sliders but all the deep colors in this image made me "play" with the vibrance. Again, I am very modest in all my slider use. I never go above +15 for clarity and never above 8 to 10 for saturation. Vibrance never goes above 15 either.
I am not very scientific at all with my slider use. It is all a visual thing for me.
Gail