Merlin

[John Whaley]

I hid for a long time in cold and wind to get this shot. I had seen the Merlin using this perch so I hoped he would come by and got lucky when he did. It was late afternoon, cloudy, blowing 25 mph+- with snow in the forecast and cold grey light. Basic LR adjust, crop and PS to remove a few twigs. Monopod, 1/1250, f6.3, auto ISO-1000, +1 ev, 1.4 III + 500 f4E FL, D500. cc

[Joseph Przybyla]

Beautiful bird, nicely shown. Love the perch, it looks like driftwood, very nicely weathered. Your description make me feel cold. Since living in Florida for fifteen years I don't go out if it is below fifty degrees, and sometimes not even above fifty. Thank you for sharing, John.

[Alex Becker]

Hi John, nice looking bird, perch, and background, and good on you for toughing out the harsh conditions. To me, the bird looks a bit too contrasty and oversharpened. Thanks for sharing!

[Ryan von Linden]

I like the image but I agree with Alex, the bird appears to be way over-sharpened.

[John Whaley]

Thanks for the feedback as always. The first one does look a little cooked but I am not sure why. No saturation applied and only 40 sharpening on the LR slider with -7 contrast. I did do a smart sharpen in PS and may have had something higher than I intended. In any case I reduced the contrast to -15, sharpening to 25, 0 saturation, temp as shot in LR and did not smart sharpen this version.

[arash_hazeghi]

Love the merlin, perch and BG, great pose, The Merlin is unfortunately a bit noisy and not quite sharp, even in the repost which is better than the OP. I assume it was a very large crop ?

[John Whaley]

Thanks Arash. Crop is about 50%. BG is water. It was blowing 25 mph+ so there may be some motion blur in the feathers. I have others where the feathers are standing out sideways.

[Gerhard Weldhagen]

Repost looks better. Well done getting this image in those windy conditions.