I find these guys very difficult to shoot. Never seem to be able to get them in perfect habitat and pleasing surroundings. So here is a shot of just one of their heads with a nice background. Best I could do in my neck of the woods. Captured yesterday in late evening light.
Canon 7d mark ii and Canon 500 f4 ii. F6.3, ISO 400, SS 1/800. -1/3rd Tripod mounted while sitting at eye level on the ground.
Converted in DPP 4 where I lowered the highlights to -2 and raised the shadows +3 to bring out a bit more in the darker feathers. In PS I applied NR to background, used NIK Detail Extractor at 50% opacity on bird to bring out as much of the definition in the face as possible and sharpened. Wish I had a higher f stop to get a little more of the head in focus and a bit more depth of field, but it was a challenging situation as the background was mostly black and the birds head was very bright from the late evening sun. Birds were moving around quite a bit so I needed to get the shutter speed fairly high to get the bird sharp. Tried a few at higher ISO and higher fstop but results were not as sharp as the shutter speed was too low. Open to suggestions on how to improve in this situation.
Last edited by Isaac Grant; 01-02-2017 at 05:05 PM.
Pretty sharp, regardless. Very nice color and detail. You say "F6.3, F8" and don't mention the SS, so I'm not sure which it is. But I would have thought you might be able to use a higher ISO.
I edited it and added the shutter speed of 1/800 and f 6.3. Should have reread my post but got distracted by my kids and just hit submit . When I used a higher ISO the face got blown out really fast. Then I lowered the exposure compensation but was not happy with results. Birds did not stay near me for too long and then walked to an area with a lousy background so time was very limited.
Beautifully sharp on the eye. I like the BKGR but for the brighter green area on our right. I am fine with the d-o-f but am confused with your ISO comments ...
Where?
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Taken on Staten Island Arthur. We have a large population that is kept under control by parks removing some and bringing them upstate from time to time.
What I mean about the ISO is this. I was shooting at ISO 400 and still had some blinkies on my camera. So I lowered the exposure compensation a bit to -1/3rd. Was at a SS of 1/800. Exposure was good but the birds were close and moving as they were being chased by a horny male (not such a foreign idea ). I wanted to get more depth of field to get all of those little hairs perfectly sharp, even the ones at the back of the head. Also wanted to increase my shutter speed as well. When I tried raising the ISO to 500 to see if it would give me a little more shutter speed the exposure was all off. Also wanted to go to say f9 as well which would of course decrease my shutter speed as well. Could have gone down to say -2/3rds or so but didn't really have time to mess with it as they were being chased away. Really the question is what is ideal when shooting a bird that is in full light against a dark background? Just lower the exposure compensation until you have proper exposure on the subject and forget about the background? Just leave it mostly black in this case or what?
Also would you clone out the green area? I left it as I thought it added some interest but could totally see a version without it.
Nice shot -- really nice details and I love the eye. I agree a bit more DOF could help but not a deal breaker. I think I see a bit of banding in the background around the green so perhaps clone that out?
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. When I used a higher ISO the face got blown out really fast. Then I lowered the exposure compensation but was not happy with results. Birds did not stay near me for too long and then walked to an area with a lousy background so time was very limited.
). I wanted to get more depth of field to get all of those little hairs perfectly sharp, even the ones at the back of the head. Also wanted to increase my shutter speed as well. When I tried raising the ISO to 500 to see if it would give me a little more shutter speed the exposure was all off. Also wanted to go to say f9 as well which would of course decrease my shutter speed as well. Could have gone down to say -2/3rds or so but didn't really have time to mess with it as they were being chased away. Really the question is what is ideal when shooting a bird that is in full light against a dark background? Just lower the exposure compensation until you have proper exposure on the subject and forget about the background? Just leave it mostly black in this case or what?
