Mid-morning Marsh Owl

[Richard Flack]

Marsh Owl
Location: Marievale Bird Sanctuary, Nigel, South Africa

It is winter in South Africa, and this presents the opportunity for early morning owling. I was very lucky to flush this owl around 9am on Saturday.
My settings weren''t ready for flight photography, as I was playing around with low fstop to accentuate background blur, but that is what it is.

I particularly liked the wing position and the nesting material was a bonus.

Canon 7d Mkii | 400mm f2.8 | ISO 500 | f4 | 1/8000 sec | Exp -0.3 | Sharpened for web / 65% of original / shadows and highlights / curve / vibrancy

Look forward to any comments or thoughts

[Arthur Morris]

Hi Richard, A question and lots of comments.

First, please explain what you mean by this: "My settings weren't t ready for flight photography, as I was playing around with low f-stop to accentuate background blur, but that is what it is."

Like you, I love the wing position and the nesting material. And he look back at you head angle.

Buts:

1-With the light from our left, the left side of the owl's face is in shadow.

2- Minus .3 EC can never be right for an early morning flight shot. By the amount of noise in the near underwing I am guessing that the original was well underexposed and that the noise I mentioned is the result of lightening the underwing.

[Daniel Cadieux]

I agree the wing position and nesting material are pretty neat - that long strand makes the central placement of the subject acceptable. There is a fair amount of colour noise on that wing, did you need to lighten it during processing? I also find the shadow on the face unfortunate.

Neat looking owl, though, congrats on a pretty cool find.

[Richard Flack]

Thanks guys!
Arthur, I was using f stop 4 as I was photographing waders and sorts and wanted a low depth of field and more background blur. I usually shoot flight shots at f6.3. Hope that helps. The first sentence may have been misleading as the photograph was taken at 9am so quite strong light, hence the -0.3 ec. Thanks for the comments. And yah, pity the light was from the side. Have a super evening!

[Richard Flack]

Dan, yip, had to lighten the wings, hence the noise. The sideways light didn't do me anyway favors and in hindsight I should have probably left the exposure at 0.

[Arthur Morris]

Thanks guys!
Arthur, I was using f stop 4 as I was photographing waders and sorts and wanted a low depth of field and more background blur. I usually shoot flight shots at f6.3. Hope that helps. The first sentence may have been misleading as the photograph was taken at 9am so quite strong light, hence the -0.3 ec. Thanks for the comments. And yah, pity the light was from the side. Have a super evening!

Thanks Richard. YAW. Minus .3 might only be right with a dark blue sky.... I thought that that is what you meant but assuming that this is at least something of a crop, the depth-of-field at f/4 is a non-issue as the relative distance was great.

Best advice for all there: check out the Another Depth-of-Field Lesson: What You See (at f/2.8) is What You Get: The 300 II/7D II Rocks a High Key Marbled Godwit blog post here to learn more.

artie

[Arthur Morris]

ps: do you have the end of the strand of nesting material in the original?

pps: if you would like to shoot me the RAW file using a large file sending service like Hightail I've be glad to take a crack at this one... (samandmayasgrandpa@att.net)

[Marina Scarr]

Love that wing position and head turn. I am okay with shadow but you might dodge it just a tad. I have a feeling Artie might just be able to make this image "sing" if you send him the RAW file.

[Lorant Voros]

Nice wing position, head turn and nesting material. I see noise under the wing and I am eager to see the result of Artie's PP work.

[Richard Flack]

Thanks so much everyone, especially Arthur! Appreciate the help so much. Arthur, I am off to work on a bit but will send you the RAW when back. That would be awesome!

[Richard Flack]

Arthur, just sent you an email with a link to dropbox. Hope that works for you, cheers. Rich

[Arthur Morris]

Arthur, just sent you an email with a link to dropbox. Hope that works for you, cheers. Rich

Thanks Richard, Lots of magic for the repost below :) Details to follow if needed as I gotta pack right now. I was right about -1/3 being way off base. I would suggest getting copies of ABP and APB II and studying, for starters... Save $10 by getting both here.

a

ps: thanks Marina for your faith in me :)

[arash_hazeghi]

the difference between poor and optimal processing is day and night, the original was a delete but the repost by Artie is def a keeper. Artie covered all the fronts

TFS

[Richard Flack]

Thanks so much Arthur, good thing I still have a day job :). If you have chance I would love to see the detail. Thanks again

[Arthur Morris]

YAW Richard, I will be beack with details asap. First a question: how much did you pay for your 400 f/2.8? Which model is it?

[Richard Flack]

Thanks Arthur, sent you an email, cheers

[Arthur Morris]

the difference between poor and optimal processing is day and night, the original was a delete but the repost by Artie is def a keeper. Artie covered all the fronts. TFS

Thanks Arash. For the repost:

RAW conversion in DPP 4. See our DPP 4 Raw Conversion Guide here.

Copied the lit eye with a Quick Mask, flopped it, added a Regular Layer Mask, and painted away with varying opacities until it looked good. All as detailed in Digital Basics here.

NeatImage Noise Reduction on the face and underwing as detailed in our Professional Post Processing Guide here.

Magical as the repost is, it is still better to get the exposure right in the field. Simply learn to expose to the right without getting any blinkies on the subject. Learning digital exposure should take no more than five minutes... See the section on Exposure Simplified in ABPP II here.

artie