I had just gotten a new Tamron 150-600mm lens, and got to try it out for the first time this weekend. It certainly added some flexibility as I found a pond with over 50 birds that were anywhere from 10' away to maybe 100' away. There were so many birds actively feeding that it was almost impossible to take a clean pic without other birds being in the picture. Was fun as there were multiple species all mingling together.
After the birds settled down with me getting into a pretty good position to shoot, I started getting lots of opportunities to capture some BIF shots. Most of them were short hops around the pond and close to the water, but occasionally some birds would take off and I would get some chances at overhead shots. Here is one of what I think was a pretty good capture:
Sony a77, Tamron 150-600mm, 150mm at f8.0, 1/3200 ISO 640
In LR CC: I made small adjustments to Highlights and Shadows, very slight adjustments to Blacks and Whites mostly to bring out white neck and black feet.
A touch of Vibrance and Red.
Cropped photo to remove some canvas from top and right.
Used Nik DFine to reduce noise.
I don't know why I was using ISO 640 except that I was so excited about the shots I forgot to change setting from earlier in the low-light morning. My camera seems to get noisy with increased ISO fairly quickly, something I really need to watch and remember to change through the morning light.
Anyway, appreciate and C&C and advice on how to take better BIF photos.
That's a terrific catch Andrew! Great DOF and nice details in the face and the wings. Not sure if the whites in the neck can be brought down anymore to bring out details there but a lovely shot!
Andrew, I am yet to get a decent BIF! So well done!
I don't believe your ISO has detracted from your image. I still get excited and manage to muck everything up. I agree with Warren about trying to bring down the whites on the neck. His thighs and feet also look a bit heavy too and I might consider lifting them a tad. The blue sky seems a little saturated to me. I like the clouds breaking the blue, but would try to soften them a bit, particularly the one behind his wing. Did you run the NR over the BG or the whole image? I really like the light coming through the wings. Beautiful. There is one small circular dark spot just in front of the upper primary. Now I have seen it, I cannot unsee it.
Beautiful! The blue & pink contrast is lovely. Judging from the far wing tip, it looks like the bird is gonna turn. Purists would probably be bothered by the shadow underneath the wing but there is nothing that you can do unless you use some fill flash. There is a dust spot right in front of the closer (to us) wing tip; easily removed. I agree with Glennie about the BG. I, too, would apply some NR on the background just to soften the sky. I love my Tamron lens, Andrew. How is it working for you so far? Do you know that you can focus lock on 400mm in addition to the 150 & 600 position? I just discovered that in Florida a few weeks ago and it was quite useful when you walk around.
Thanks everyone for the kind comments. I'll see if I can darken the whites a bit more -- when I did that earlier it darkened the legs even more so I opted to keep it as it is presented here. I will probably go ahead and take into PS CC and work on what was suggested: try to bring out some white details in the neck area, maybe dodge the bird's feet to lighten them. As for the background, I will need to spend a little more time with Nik DFine to understand how to apply NR to background. This first time using, I simply let it take the automatic settings and I think it applied to entire pic. Also ...... Does NR also soften an image? Are there other tools that you can use to soften an image (Clarity?)
Adhika, was first time using lens. I was such a spaz with it most of the time. I have pictures taken where I go back and look and realize I had extra zoom still available with the lens and I could have gotten it closer. I think the focus was not as fast as my previous lens (300mm Minolta f4 prime), and I have a lot of pics that were misses, but that could have been because of me playing with focus options. I also need to work on focus-and recompose. I can occasionally get the focus right on the eye, but then I've "centered" the bird and I sometimes clip or don't get enough canvas.
But I like the lens for exactly the situation I was in -- some birds were so close that the 300mm would not have been able to capture the whole image properly. And then I have twice the reach for those "farther away" shots. I'm still learning about it, but I don't remember seeing focus lock options. The Sony version of this lens is a bit different than the Canon version, e.g. the Sony version does not have in-camera stabilization (Sony has built IS into the camera body).
Well, again, thanks for everyone's comments and hopefully I can get a re-post up in a day or so.
Andrews, I think working in PS will be good. However, see if you can bring the highlights down and the blacks (or maybe shadow) in LR first. There is a lot of leeway there. It's such a game of moving sliders; left, right backwards forwards. Start at the top and work your way down. I always look at, but seldom use the Contrast slider. And later, haven't been touching the clarity or vibrance sliders.
When you take the image into Nik you should have the bird selected so you don't soften the bird. I tried NIK and found the auto NR pretty good. NR does soften the image. There are also plenty of blur tools to use to soften an images BG. But you will still have to mask the bird. Clarity does not soften.
Andrew, this is a good image. You (and me!) need to stop panicing when an opportunity arises. Think before you get there. What's the weather like? Time of day? What sort of birds are you stalking?
Wonderful catch!! Would be better if the bird were approaching you, but we take what we can get.
Yes, definitely do all you can with lights and darks in LR. When you go to PS you have set the tonalities in cement. Each time you move Highlights or Shadows, you'll need to balance with the other and with Exposure, With a little practice about 2 iterations will do it. Here, the feet are in the shade, so maybe not a lot you can do. I might lighten the sky a bit, either with Exposure or maybe just lighten Blues in HSL.
Does that lens come in a Sony version or do you need an adapter? I was shooting at our egret rookery the other day and a guy had the new Sony, a77 R2 or something -- the one that has gotten so much attention lately. He had the new Canon 100-400 II on it with an adapter -- Metabones, maybe? I asked him how it was for autofocus and he said it was so poor that he had to use manual focus. I shudder to think if he got any keepers at all -- he was shooting them flying. No way I could do that -- the acceptable DOF is maybe a foot at most.
Diane: The Sony I shoot with uses the older Sony/Minolta "A" mount, which means I can use older (less expensive) Minolta lenses and a good selection of Sony "A" lenses. Again, with IS built into the camera body, it does not have to be in the lens and therefore Sony "A" lenses are significantly cheaper than comparable Canon lenses. Now, the newest Sony cameras are using a different mount ("FE" mount I think) but have also been set up to use "A" lenses, Canon lenses, Nikon lenses with the appropriate MetaBones adapter. The new Sony A7RII camera is a sweet 48mp camera, and has very fast focus when using "EF" lenses, but Sony lacks native "EF" mount big-lenses needed for birding. And thus the MetaBones, which gives you access to other makes of lenses at a loss of AF speed.
Tamron makes the 150-600 f5.6 for Canon, Nikon and Sony, with the Sony version being an "A"mount lens (and thus lacks the internal IS that are included inside the Canon/Nikon versions). I have the Sony version lens, so I don't have to use an adapter and can mount it straight to my A77.
Here is repost with edits -- removed dust bunny spot, lightened up feet, dropped blue some from background and ran through DFine once more (still can't figure out how to get just the BG) ....
I've given up trying to keep up with all the lens/camera combinations (or even just the cameras), but glad you found one working for you.
Almost all the information here is in the left half of the histogram. The first one was a little better in that respect. I'd start over with Exposure to get midtones in the middle, then try to balance Highlights down and Shadows up. Then use Blacks and Whites to finish the ends of the histogram. It is the absolute key to your adjustments.
Watch your exposures and don't underexpose -- it will cause problems such as noise when you bring it up.
Dfine rarely needs masking. Try it on the whole image -- it will make a new layer and you can click it on and off and mask if needed by selecting either the bird or sky, whichever is easier.
I tried to follow your instructions. I increased Exposure to move everything to the (histogram) left. Small bump to Contrast. Highlights down, but when I played with Shadows it got the feet black too fast, so I left it alone. I had to moves Whites all the way left and I still think there are overexposed areas. Left the Black alone. You can't see it but I boosted red in Hue just a bit.
Diane, was this more of what you were looking for?
Your first is the best of these 3. Now it's overexposed with a thin look and far too much saturation. Hard to say without having the raw file, but go back to the "zeroed" raw file and try (these are guesses from you first post) about +1 with Exposure, keep Contrast at 0, do not move whites negative. Saturation is way too much. In your last post, Blacks need to come left, not whites.
Do you have a good and calibrated monitor?
If you want to post the raw file on a Dropbox acct, I'll see if I have time to look at it.
LOL. Well ****. No, I don't have a very good monitor. New system (and much better monitors) might happen later this year.
That was strange; I did not see that much saturation until I looked again, and .... ugh. Don't have a DropBox account, but no worries, I'll make another go at this starting from scratch (the original raw file). As long as you don't mind me keeping on ........
Now look at the histogram. Maybe less + exposure -- the histogram is a light meter on steroids. Then pull Highlights left to tame the brightest areas. That may be all you need. Less is better.
A good monitor with calibration is really important. Even a lesser one can be helped with calibration but if you get a new one you might have to upgrade the calibration package so wiser to hold off. A lot of it is just learning to see things correctly.
Andrew,fascinating watching you try to get the best from your wonderful capture. the latest incarnation being by far the best to me,although as Diane has already stated a tad too bright ,but I think you are really closing down on getting this right .
Andrew i'm way behind you on post,no PS yet but there is a little process I have running through my head when trying to work up an image that I repeat to myself,"remember how powerful these tools are and what did it look like in nature?" This simplicity might just help you. I find it so easy to overuse these tools sure I don't have access to much but my constant self checking I think really helps,I also go back and compare my original often.
Ahh mate that pink with the light through it backed by the blue just does it for me,even though I feel you will grab more from this yet.
Thanks for posting it's once again been a learning curve for me too another great etl thread
BIF Spoonbill
