European Starlings (Re-processed)

[David Roberts]

I re-processed my earlier photo to minimize the noise at Doug West's suggestion.

[arash_hazeghi]

Welcome to BPN David,

Nice first post! I really like the mating action here! you caught the right moment. The image has a number of processing issues including noise, coarse details, blocked blacks and a color cast. The BG looks shows artifacts in the upper left corner and overall isn't very pleasing because of its color (was it a man made object?). A natural color BG is more pleasing. Another issue is that The birds are too big in the frame and the front bird is OOF. Please also include your EXIF so we can provide better critique. Be sure to check the resources in the ETL forum as well
TFS and welcome again

[David Roberts]

Thanks, Arash. The exif was in the original post -- "D800, 1/800 sec, 5.6, 480mm (Nikon 200-500), ISO 5000. I shot in the early morning, so the colors are somewhat muted. The feet of the right bird were cut off because he's standing knee-deep (and tail-deep) in a mountain of suet. If I decide to print it large, I'll definitely try to minimize the effect of the noise."

[Gabriela Plesea]

A very warm welcome to BPN, David!

Some serious interaction here from your subjects and I love the body language and expression from the two protagonists!

Would be interested to know where the Focal Point is in this image. Also, could you describe your processing steps and software you are using, in order to receive more detailed feedback?

In my opinion the shutter speed was a bit low here, I also feel F5.6 was not enough. But I do a appreciate you pushing ISO, given those poor lighting conditions! Since you are obviously attracting those birds with some delicious suet, I would humbly suggest you try tempt them at such a time when the light is sweetest, be it mornings or afternoons. The blacks are quite chocked in places (lack of detail) and composition is not all that pleasing with the female's legs cut off. I do like the BG, save for some artefacts in the bottom right corner:)

David, please to not be put off by our critique and comments - we are all here to learn from each other. Another humble suggestion from me, have you considered exposing to the right (ETTR) in such low light conditions? It might have helped in this situation. I am not familiar with your gear and unsure whether you could up the ISO further, just thinking that by doing so you would have gained more detail in the shadow areas. The whole idea of shooting ETTR is to expose a scene as bright as possible but without blowing highlights (if any) or losing data. Just remember to watch the histogram in-between frames:)

I really appreciate this first post from you and I sincerely hope you will be back with more

Kind regards,

[David Roberts]

Thanks, Gabriela. The focus point was where the wing meets the body on the airborne bird. It was early morning -- about 30 minutes after the sun came up -- they like to eat early. Even shooting at 1/800 and 5.6, all I could manage was ISO 5000. Increasing the speed was giving me an ISO of 8000, and the 200-500mm doesn't get any faster than 5.6. Also, this was about a sixth of the original photo -- shot from about 30 feet away. I used DXO, but didn't tweak it much there, moved into Photoshop to add contrast and vibrancy, and then Nik for sharpening. Don't worry about upsetting me -- I know it's not a 'good' photo -- just an 'interesting' one.

[Gabriela Plesea]

Thank you David, appreciate your answer. I took this into Photoshop, reduced contrast as well as vibrance. Lifted the blacks a bit as there is still some detail in places to be extracted. Reduced saturation on some of the colours, just a tad. Cropped even further and did another round of sharpening. Send me a PM with your email address if you like, I will email this RP to you.

Have a lovely week-end,