Piping Plover fluff ball

[Isaac Grant]

This is not the same type of shot as I have posted so nice to post something different. I photographed this little fluff ball at Breezy Point in Queens, New York on 6/17/16. There were 2 families of plovers that were hanging out together and all of the babies were roaming around the beach. I set up in one spot and let the birds come to me. After a while this guy got so close that I could not focus on it anymore. Eventually it sat down in my shadow. This shot is full frame except for the sides that I cropped off as they didn't add anything to the shot in my opinion. Another square crop I guess but I like it as I wanted the full attention set on the adorable little baby. This is the sharpest I have been able to get one of these guys. They are so little and fast that I am never happy with how my shots come of them.

Canon 7d2 with Canon 500 f4 ii + 1.4xiii. Tripod mounted on lowest setting. F9, ISO 500, SS 1/1250. 2 focus points placed above and below the left eye.

Converted in DPP 4. Auto white balance. Lifted shadows and +2 and exposure +.33. In PS I cropped, sharpened and applied noise reduction to background. Also cleaned up a small bit of beach debris.

[keith mitchell]

Very cute little Plover Isaac which sounds like it was hard to capture,I know we try to keep that softness with these little ones but it does look a bit OOF to me.

Keith.

[Daniel Cadieux]

ha ha too cute! I love the head-on walking pose with the huge foot showing. Sun directly behind you, and a clean beach (although I do see some repeating patterns due to cloning. I do miss a catchlight or reflection in the eye(s). Nice texture to the fuzzball feathers of the young one :-)

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Isaac, lovely low perspective here, and with good eye contact from the youngster. With their soft fuzziness, its difficult to achieve 'sharpness', but the top of the head is in perfect focus, so this works for me.

[Isaac Grant]

Thanks for noticing the repeating shell. I posted the wrong version of this pic. I am sure it won't be the last time I do something like that. And these guys don't have any catchlight. Their eyes are funny. If I try and mess with them at all they just look weird so I leave them alone. Anyway here it is without the repeating pattern.

[Marina Scarr]

Cuteness personified. Unfortunately, it's very difficult to capture a catchlight in these plover chicks. Love seeing all those feather details and the raised foot. You also wish to capture this wee one smaller in the frame to more fully demonstrate its vulnerability at this young age.

[Arthur Morris]

Love the cute little thing on the ridge and the fact that you got him right down sun angle. Critical sharpness is just not there. Have you LensAlign FocusTune/micro-adjusted that rig?

a

[Isaac Grant]

I have not. Honestly Arthur I really struggle with these baby plovers. I just never get any photos of them that look tack sharp. Does not matter the distance between me and the birds. They just never look sharp to me. All of the other shots I have posted do not suffer from lack of sharpness so I am not sure it is the lens but am open to all.

[Arthur Morris]

Maybe the babies are related to the eyes of Greater Flamingoes or either of the scaups... I can never get any of those sharp.

How big was the crop for this one?

a

[Isaac Grant]

full frame. I only cropped it as square so lost a bit on the sides. I have hundreds of shots of these guys that I just delete. I wonder if there is something about them that just makes them look blurry. Some kind of natural defense mechanism.