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Thread: Montezuma Oropendola

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    Default Montezuma Oropendola

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    Taken in Costa Rica earlier this year. This species was a surprise to me, I never expected them to be so big. Photographic wise they can be a bit difficult, with the dark feathers, the bright background and also the little blue spot on the side of the face is very easy to overexpose the side of the face or to underexpose the dark feathers.. I ran a detail extractor in nik tool to be able to get the proper blue and pink on the side of the face in this case. The original image was underexposed since I use a very low ISO, but i'm glad I did since I managed to receover the shadows without much noise and was able to get details out of that bright side on the face as well.

    Nikon D750
    300mm f2.8 w/ 2.0x TC

    ƒ/5.6
    1/640
    ISO 160
    Last edited by Raybel Robles; 12-10-2017 at 01:20 PM.

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    Interesting Pose. I wish the bird was parallel to the Camera ( that's my preference ), I like this one also.

    I like the perch and clean green background.

    Thanks for sharing.

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    Lifetime Member Colin Driscoll's Avatar
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    Not a classic pose but I like the way the bird is just going about it's main business of looking for a meal. Great background and overall well presented.

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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    Wicked bird and a nice photo. Was ISO 160 a choice or a mistake. I rarely if every go below ISO 400 with my 5D Mark IV bodies. Was this bird coming to a feeder?

    with love, artie

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    Quote Originally Posted by Arthur Morris View Post
    Wicked bird and a nice photo. Was ISO 160 a choice or a mistake. I rarely if every go below ISO 400 with my 5D Mark IV bodies. Was this bird coming to a feeder?

    with love, artie

    ps: hope to see you in FEB; I will be in touch.
    Hi Artie, the low ISO was mistake of some sorth. The bird was coming near to a feeder but not to the feeder itself. He will only fly in look around and fly back out in a matter of seconds. This is why I didn't had much time to adjust proprely and I did intent to lower the ISO because I kept over exposing the bright side of the face on different occasions and in the rush of lowering the ISO I lowered it more than I wanted to.

    Looking forward as well to meeting in Feb.

    Ray

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    BPN Member Bill Dix's Avatar
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    Good work correcting for a few difficulties in exposure. I like the quizzical look, the perch and background. Of course having the bird more parallel would have been good, but it doesn't always happen that way.

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    Super Moderator Daniel Cadieux's Avatar
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    I know you know this, but just raise the shutter speed with a higher ISO, and you should get the same result, with the added bonus of more leeway as far as camera/subject motion goes. Anyhow, very cool bird, and I like the perch. Just how big are they?

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    I can relate to the difficulties you had exposing this one, Ray. I have come across this type of problem before and think you've done very well here to achieve the tone and colour you have. In cases like this, I usually makes selections of the 'problem' areas and do lighting adjustments on those areas but I'm guessing you have done the same. Pretty amazing looking bird too and I like the pose here even though it might not be considered ideal. Background and perch all work well with the composition you've chosen. Thanks for sharing.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Daniel Cadieux View Post
    I know you know this, but just raise the shutter speed with a higher ISO, and you should get the same result, with the added bonus of more leeway as far as camera/subject motion goes. Anyhow, very cool bird, and I like the perch. Just how big are they?
    My idea behind lowering the ISO rather than increasing the shutter was to minimize the noise once I lift the shadows on the bird. As good as my D750 is, I knew if I had gone with a high ISO and still getting the bird underexposed it would had been nightmare once I lift the shadows in PP.

    The Montezuma is about the size of a Toucan, the first thing I said when I saw was "woah they are big".

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    Super Moderator Daniel Cadieux's Avatar
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    A Toucan?? Yep, they are big!

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    It looks like your post processing worked out well, Raybel. A very nice image of this awesome bird.

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