northern shoveler

[annmpacheco]

Taken a few days ago in Southern California. Gail B. and I had long looked forward to finally meeting David Salem and we designed a private workshop to meet our needs. Super pleased, super time, and super birds! While shooting ducks one morning, we were met fellow BPN'ers Glenn Conlan, Tim Foltz and Kirk Benson. It was a blast to be lined up and have shouts of incoming "right or left" as the ducks flew in. Then, the group giving a high five whenever one or more of us got a smoking good shot! so here's mine. I was able to get half a dozen keepers on this duck as i panned and tracked him.
Processed in LR/PS, toned down the whites, lifted shadows, and neat image. 2nd round of selective smart sharpening on head...
Thanks Dave!

1Dx
840mm
handheld

iso 800
6.3
1/2500

[stuart wanuck]

lovely action capture

[gail bisson]

"Rock star" image #1!Tack sharp, perfect wing pose and love the IQ!
Gail

[Randy Stout]

Ann:

Outstanding indeed, one of the better Shoveler flight images I have seen. Colors, pose, background, all rock.

Cheers

Randy

[Joseph Przybyla]

I echo the previous comments, really outstanding image. I cannot see how you could improve it. Thank you for sharing, Ann.

[Isaac Grant]

Oh man does that duck looks fantastic. Wow. Congrats Ann. Pose and details are top notch and the stand out amazingly well against that dark background. I am not sure if I am seeing this correctly but it looks like there is a repeating cloning pattern on the bottom right above your signature. Or maybe that is a fence or something? There are multiple triangle looking things. Also on the bottom left where the green meets the brown you have some posterization.

[Tim Foltz]

Ann, You nailed it, glad to see you got a real winner. Everything is spot on.

-Tim

[Glenn Pure]

Beautiful pose, beautiful bird, beautiful background, great POV and all nicely composed. My only wish if for a little more detail in the whites but I am being picky. This is really great work and nice to hear you had a great time getting it too.

[annmpacheco]

Oh man does that duck looks fantastic. Wow. Congrats Ann. Pose and details are top notch and the stand out amazingly well against that dark background. I am not sure if I am seeing this correctly but it looks like there is a repeating cloning pattern on the bottom right above your signature. Or maybe that is a fence or something? There are multiple triangle looking things. Also on the bottom left where the green meets the brown you have some posterization.

Hi Isaac,
I did not do any cloning on this image, and yes there is some or slight posterization and it is there on the RAW, so what does one do? Any suggestions?

[David Salem]

What a smoking image Ann!! You know how much I liked this one, so much so that I had to process it as soon as I saw it. About as good as it gets. Full wings down, great HA and killer details and BG colors. You might want to print that one!

I see Isaacs comments on the repeat but it is in the original so it's nothing you did but I do notice the posterizing that isn't in the one that we processed together for the web. Also it isn't quite as sharp as the one we did either. Not sure what happened. Maybe you used the one that we did together and then reprocessed it with your signature. This will degrade it and cause posterizing and loss of some more detail.
I am adding the exact one we did together so you can see the difference. It's not bad at all but it could be better.

It was great meeting you and shooting together. I had a ton of fun shooting with you girls. See you in October

[Isaac Grant]

Take Dave up on that offer and see what you guys can do. Feel free to call me as well and maybe I can help you figure it out if I saw the full res file. It most often happens from downsizing but could also be from too aggressive NR to the background or from too much pushing of the shadows. That is a pretty cool natural repeating pattern! Whatever Dave did to his repost was an improvement as it got rid of the posterization and the bird went from looking great to looking perfect.

[Doug Brown]

Pretty sweet Ann!

[Arthur Morris]

This is at least the equal of David's best drake shoveler. That and many other amazing images made with Canon gear will be featured on my blog tomorrow.

with love and nice meeting you, artie

[David Salem]

I told you it looked just like one of my best shoveler shots

[annmpacheco]

Thank you all for your kind comments and critiques, much appreciated, we have an awesome community here on BPN.

[Mike Poole]

It looks like you all had a ball out there - another trip for my bucket list!

Fantastic pose from a great looking duck - Davids RP has a little more detail as well

Mike

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Ann, one of the best Shoveller images I have seen. You have really nailed this. All been said above, and big congrats on a fine image and capture.

Dave's repost shows us what can be done.

[Juan Tolentino]

Ann, I can just echo all the nice comments already made. This is a very unique image and the best I've ever seen on this species. Congratulations and thank you for letting us see it first.