Puffin

[Alex Becker]

Hi all,

Another puffin from Farne Islands on a cloudy am. In post, standard LR sliders for me, cloned out a green bit in the center top of the BG to keep the cliffside all brown, and then a very slight crop, a bit of NR on BG and sharpened in PS.

Camera: Nikon D500
Lens: 200-500mm f/5.6 at 440mm
Specs: 1/400 ISO 800 f/6.3

Thanks for looking and commenting on prior posts!
Alex

[gail bisson]

This is really nice Alex.
Love the peek-a-boo view of the leg and the toenail.
Great POV and DOF.
IQ is excellent and the detail in the feathers is great.Whites are spot on.
My only issue is with the funky reflection in the eye. I might try to do some eye doctor work on it. Reflection looks like a tripod?
Gail

[Adhika Lie]

Basically what Gail said. Excellent work here, Alex. I am a big fan of being able to see the feet and yet not having to deal with OOF foreground. Very very pleasing! I hope you will find a way to fix the eye.

[Randy Stout]

Alex:

Excellent critique by Gail. I was drawn to the eye, trying to figure out the cause of the unusual appearance.

Such a nice image, worth some eye tinkering.

Cheers

Randy

[Alex Becker]

Thanks all -- very much appreciated and glad you like the image. I took another look at the eye in PS and tried to do some work on it. I don't have much practice with that type of editing so hopefully this RP helps. Thanks again!

[Daniel Cadieux]

I love the layering in the feathers, and the perfect head angle. Just enough rock showing, and that is a beautiful background you got here. I can't help but think the blacks cold go a touch deeper, but it is still fine OK as is. The repost addresses the eye, but the pupil location looks odd - Id lower it more. Good stuff, I'm enjoying your puffins!

[Isaac Grant]

Very nice shot of this bird. Great head angle and set off nicely against that brown background. As with the other image I too find this one a bit flat. Agree with Dan re the blacks, but also see a blue cast to the whites on the breast and some of the whites on the rock, the white on the right edge of the breast and the white of the eye that can not be seen are a bit over blown. I did the following as a quick example of things I think will help.

Selected only the bird and in levels raised the black to 3. Lowered the mids to 99
In selective color I added a few points of black to the blacks and took a few points of black away from the whites
In hue/saturation I lowered the saturation of the blue -90
I burned a few of the brightest spots on the edge of the chest and eye arc
Ran a detail extractor/tonal contrast mask on the bird at 25 percent opacity to try and bring out a little more in the whites and the face
I cloned out a few of the brightest spots of white on the rocks

Thoughts?

[William Dickson]

Very well done Alex. A lovely bird, nicely captured. Great details and POV. I also like the BG and colours on the perch.

Will

[Mike Poole]

Nice solid puffin shot Alex. My first thoughts were the whites were a bit bright, and agree with what Isaac has done with his RP.

Mike

[Alex Becker]

Thanks all for commenting and giving your thoughts -- very appreciated.

Isaac, thanks a lot for the RP and again for giving a detailed explanation of what you've changed -- it's really helpful for me. I like the trick of adding some black to the blacks and removing it from the whites, it really does give more pop and a cleaner look. I need to hammer that into my WF for these types of shots. Agree with cloning the major spots as well. I didn't feel the need to do it on the first pass but it does look nicer in the RP. I never really use a detail extractor but looking at your edit I should play with it more. Burning some of the brightest spots has brought out more texture as well. I'll revisit this image and try these things as well as work them into future edits of these guys. Thanks again!