American Redstart

[Jim Crosswell]

This was taken last May at a local conservation area close to my house. All C&Cs are welcome and appreciated.

Canon 1D MK IV
500L f4
1.4 Extender
ISO 800
1/200s
f5.6
Tripod

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Jim ......... stunning clean image of a very nice bird.Love the detail you extracted and the overall tone/color palette.
Nice work .

TFS Andreas

[John Robinson]

Hi Jim
What a georgeous bird indeed. And Ilike the BG which sets it ff very well.
A pair of our Redstarts have just started build ing in the garden- bit late this year.
cHEERS
jOHN

[Randy Stout]

Jim
good detail in darks. I like the thin looping perch, the head angle, excellent catchlight.

I do think the overall image is a bit dark and murky, as the whites are quite subdued. Matter of taste, but believe it would show better overall with a modest increase in the exposure (somewhere in the +.5 - .6 range on my monitor).

Cheers

Randy

[William Dickson]

Cracker of a frame Jim. The colours on the bird look really well against that BG. Lovely HA and POV. Good work and thanks for sharing

Will

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

A little tight at the LLC for me. But otherwise a super image. Love the contrasting colours and the tiny curved perch.

[gail bisson]

I love these birds.
I have to agree with Randy on this image.
I also find the BG with OOF branches not to my taste.Aren't I picky!
Gail

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Jim, excellent exposure on the blacks, and the yellows/oranges really mix nicely on this fellow. You have a great angled pose, and I do like the thin perch.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Jim a matter of taste regarding exposure /brightness .
What Randy suggested does not work as described , unless you like to have a clipped red channel and loose some fine detail in certain areas .
I did the red channel trick plus some tiny tricks more

WDYT ? and others too .

Cheers Andreas

[Jim Crosswell]

I like what you have done here Andreas. The whites look much better in your version. Thanks for taking the time to give it a few tweaks!

[Randy Stout]

Hi Jim a matter of taste regarding exposure /brightness .
What Randy suggested does not work as described , unless you like to have a clipped red channel and loose some fine detail in certain areas .
I did the red channel trick plus some tiny tricks more

WDYT ? and others too .

Cheers Andreas

Andreas:

Raising the exposure .55, gave the absolute brightest red channel reading in the image at 91% on the white/orange area on wing, with no clipping in lightroom. Perhaps you are using a different program? I don't have Photoshop at work, but will recheck that at home later.

Randy

[Andreas Liedmann]

Randy i took the image into PS and used ACR for your suggested exposure increase , the result after running ACR is a clipped RED channel !!!
As ACR and LR are the same basically , you should get the result as me , but you are right too , as ACR does not show any clipping in the RED channel ........ think whatever you think about it , i do think who is wrong ACR/LR or PS ????

Cheers Andreas

[David Salem]

Man you sure get allot of great dicky bird shots! This one has some beautiful detail and color. Well done Jim