A cold Virginia dove

[Ann Gray]

I did not crop...but I did clone out an invisible fence stake! other edits in LR. Olympus OMD em5 with 75-300 lens. F7.5 @ 1/320 sec. ISO 200.
focal length 600 mm. The bird is puffed to stay warm today!

[Glennie Passier]

Ann, Nice little bird. He does look cold! If this image were mine, I would be cropping at least half of the bottom of this image. There is not a lot happening amongst the wood chip. I would also take a slice off the LHS. The cloning looks a little obvious in places. I'm not able to comment on the colour of the bird, but feel there is a pinkish cast happening here. I would have preferred to see the birds tail and feet, but he probably feels a lot warmer hiding in the chips which could be making a bit of combustible heat. Very minor nits of the upper RH corner; a tiny black slither of something? I would clone it out. And some of the brighter OOF sticks above his head; I would consider toning down.

I hope he comes back for you. Thank you for sharing.

[Ann Gray]

Thanks for your comments. The doves hang around my yard, but I hope he doesn't need to try to stay warm here much longer.

[Diane Miller]

The bird is unfortunately very small in the frame and lost against a busy BG. Small in the frame can work if the BG is lovely out of focus tree branches or the like. But the huddled position of the bird, authentic behavior as it may be, just doesn't work as an image when you have a busy BG. We sometimes see very nice images of birds huddled down on a non-competing white sandy beach or the like, with a few interesting and artistic bits such as grass clumps, to balance the composition.

There are inherent image quality issues with this very small sensor and not-exactly-pro quality lens. They can be made to work with careful choice of subject, but you have more challenges than with a bigger rig.

The dove looks like a good practice subject. If it only stays on the ground, your best bet is to get the lens right on the ground (with a smooth area in front of it) so the depth of field will minimize foreground and background by rendering them more out of focus. And get close enough that the dove is larger in the frame, unless there are other very interesting things balancing it.

It looks like focus landed on the bark just in front of the dove, too. Precise focus will be another challenge to work on, as will getting a subject at an angle where the head and closest part of the body are in the same plane.

[Ann Gray]

Thanks for your comments/suggestions. I hope I get another chance with a dove.