Lincoln's Sparrow Bathing

[Bill Dix]

While we're on Sparrows, here's another that I don't get often in New Jersey. In fact it has been a nemesis bird for years. You wouldn't think I'd have to go to Texas to find one, but this one was bathing in a pool at Laguna Seca Ranch in S. Texas, late one afternoon in November.

D500, Sigma 150-600 @ 600mm; ISO 2500, 1/400s @ f/7.1 manual.

PS. Posted at Sparrow-size, 1200 px. I don't know if the recent change has affected the way images are appearing, but this 1200 px image on BPN looks smaller and less sharp than the same jpeg (saved for web) on my screen prior to posting (11.3 inches here vs. 12.6 inches at 100% on my screen.) I've noticed this on a few others.

[Geoffrey Montagu]

First thing I noticed was how uncharacteristically less sharp than your previous postings at 1200 px. This was a great moment we had with this LISP visiting and taking a bath. Not to mention the suns ray spotlighting him was outstanding. Great POV and love that he's standing up to his belly in the water. Like the BG as well.

Geoffrey




https://500px.com/geoffreymontagu

[Randy Stout]

Bill:

Like him except for the softness. I have been playing with larger image posts, and have been noticing less predictable sharpening results than with 1200 size also. Will keep tinkering with it.

Cheers

Randy

[Bill Dix]

As I said, the posted image looks much softer than the same jpeg prior to posting. Just as a test, here's a version in which I've sharpened to a point that looks seriously oversharpened on my screen. I'm curious to see what it looks like when posted.

ps. in the preview screen it doesn't look nearly as overshapened as in the unposted version. Go figure??

[Juan Tolentino]

Hello Bill, your second post doesn't look over sharpened on my screen. Was this a large crop? I like the POV and the HA. I don't know this species and I can't comment on the vibrant feather colors. Thank you for sharing.

[Bill Dix]

Thanks Juan. I agree. This one looks about right. It's odd that to have it look right after posting, I had to create a version that was way oversharpened in PS. The version that looked right prior to posting was soft. I haven't had that happen before. This is cropped to about 65% of full width.

[Joseph Przybyla]

Hey Bill, lovely bird, nice finding one you have been hoping to capture. The repost looks sharp, I might lower the contrast a tad. Thank you for sharing.