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Thread: Violet Saberwing

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    Lifetime Member David Salem's Avatar
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    Default Violet Saberwing

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    Another one from my great trip to Costa Rica with Doug Brown, Greg Basco and Glenn Conlan.
    Although I have really never done any set-up photography, and I primarily concentrate on wild action and flight, it was pretty fun and interesting to do some of the set up shots.
    We spent a few days shooting hummingbirds utilizing Doug and Greg's multi flash setups. They did a great job getting us set-up and it was lots of fun watching and waiting for different species to come into your flower and trying to capture some cool frames with dynamic poses.
    This was my favorite hummingbird frame of my trip. I really like the Funky pose and the nice colors and details. He did this defensive pose as another Hummer came in from behind him. These hummers are viciously territorial of the feeders and most of the time one of them would be the king and chase every other bird off. This was him!!
    I just realized that we don't see to many humming bird flight frames posted here so I hope you like it.

    1DXII---300mm---f11---ss1/200th---ISO400---Setup on tripod with shutter release---Multi Flash---20% crop

    Thanks as always for looking and for your input. I appreciate it

    David
    Last edited by David Salem; 03-07-2018 at 01:32 AM.
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    This is so sweet! Detail and colors are amazing but the contorted pose is really what does it. I really like how we can
    see the tail through the wing! A stunning shot.

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    BPN Member Tim Foltz's Avatar
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    Dave, Wonderful colors, sharpness, action, BG and most of all pose.
    I'm not a fan of setups but the fact that you were upfront and didn't try to mislead as I have seen on other forums I appreciate that.
    This type of photography has it's own merits and I can appreciate that.

    -Tim

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    Lifetime Member Colin Driscoll's Avatar
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    Superb! That bill looks like it's made of tungsten steel.

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    Lifetime Member gail bisson's Avatar
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    Pretty amazing! The detail is mind blowing.
    Pose is superb.
    Good comp and POV and I like the little flowers.
    I would back off on the sharpening of the flower-I know the little bristles are supposed to be there but I would be tempted to soften them.
    How many cups of coffee did it take to get this beauty?!!
    Gail

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    Quote Originally Posted by gail bisson View Post
    Pretty amazing! The detail is mind blowing.
    Pose is superb.
    Good comp and POV and I like the little flowers.
    I would back off on the sharpening of the flower-I know the little bristles are supposed to be there but I would be tempted to soften them.
    How many cups of coffee did it take to get this beauty?!!
    Gail
    Agree with Gail on this one. Amazing detail, IQ and pose. Beautiful smooth bg. I would soften the flowers. It is probably from the flash but the highlights make it look a bit over sharpened on my monitor.
    Last edited by John Whaley; 03-07-2018 at 10:00 AM.

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    Lifetime Member gail bisson's Avatar
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    I looked at this again and perhaps it is not a question of softening but of reducing the brightness on the flowers or perhaps a combo of both,
    gail

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    BPN Member Bill Dix's Avatar
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    Amazing pose, exquisite detail. I do feel that there is a bit of added thrill in capturing a purely natural shot in the wild, but that doesn't diminish the fun, and the beauty, of multi-flash set-ups. It must have been a kick to see this one in the camera.

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    Total rock star image Dave. Just great in every way. Fantastic pose and details against a perfect background. I don't remember seeing a more interesting hummingbird photo in a long time. It is amazing to me that such low shutter speeds work for this kind of shot. As someone who has never shot with flash, I just can't wrap my head around it. What lens did you use?

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    Lifetime Member David Salem's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by gail bisson View Post
    Pretty amazing! The detail is mind blowing.
    Pose is superb.
    Good comp and POV and I like the little flowers.
    I would back off on the sharpening of the flower-I know the little bristles are supposed to be there but I would be tempted to soften them.
    How many cups of coffee did it take to get this beauty?!!
    Gail
    Thanks Gail,

    Glad you like it. Yes it did take quite a few cups of coffee to get this one, but the coffee in Costa Rica is fantastic, so it was a pleasure

    The flower and stalk definitely have hairy bristles on them and I am sure they pick up more light from the flash. As you mentioned, it's not the sharpening, it's the light.
    I did a little burning to the flowers and stalk and it definitely looks better. Thanks for keeping those eyes open for me. I appreciate it.
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    Lifetime Member Stu Bowie's Avatar
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    Hi Dave, this is simply amazing. I havent seen this pose from a HB coming in to feed, and great DOF and sharpness all over. I prefer your OP with regards to the detail, and dont feel its over sharpened or too bright.

    Well, this would sure be an early runner for IOTY 2018, but sadly you cant qualify, but I'm sure you could enter it elsewhere.

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    Lifetime Member David Salem's Avatar
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    Thanks Isaac!! Glad you like it.

    I was in the same boat as you when it came to flash photography. Completely in the dark!!
    I did a trip about 4 years ago to Florida and I used my flash for the first time and only time. I got a tiny bit of understanding of it on that shoot, but not much.
    Four years later and it was as foreign as ever. I bought a better beamer and a bracket for my tripod and headed to Costa Rica without the foggiest clue of how to operate it.
    All I knew was where the on-off button was. Actually most of the group hadn't a clue either so we all depended on Doug and Greg to help us and set our flashes up.
    After some great tutorials from Doug and Greg, I started to catch on to the theory of how the flash works and when to use it.
    Two things to know. Flash as fill light or flash as main light. This shot is flash as main light.
    You asked the same questions I use to about shutter speed. How the heck can you get great sharp images at such slow shutter speeds??
    The humming bird shoot taught me, but the night time bat photography made it all so clear.
    When you understand that the flash is not only the light source, it is also the shutter speed!!! Flash power and flash duration are the formula.
    The speed at which the flash bursts is in effect the shutter speed. So the cool thing is you use the camera's exposure for the BG and the flash exposure for the subject.
    Those camera settings that you see on this shot have little bearing on the humming birds exposure, well with DOF, but not shutter speed. Those are set for the BG. You can expose to get a darker BG or a little lighter BG but the flash is still constant and "IS" the shutter speed.
    It was really cool when we shot Bats at night. We all setup on the flower that the bats are feeding on in the complete dark. The exposure that we set is only for the DOF. The shutter speed could be 30 seconds although we used 3-4 seconds. How are they all killer sharp?? The flashes burst at 1/20,000th of a second which freezes the action perfectly! It's black as coal, then for a 20,000th of a second, the bat is fully lit. Its totally the flash.
    Anyway it was a great learning experience even though I don't have need for a flash to often, it is cool to finally understand how it works and I won't be as intimidated to use it in the future.
    Thanks again and hope this shines a little light on the subject, literally
    Oops forgot to mention that I used a Sigma 150-600 contemporary. I bought a used one before the trip as I didn't have a intermediate lens for my trip, besides my old Canon 100-400 which is a pile!
    Last edited by David Salem; 03-07-2018 at 03:12 PM.
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    Lifetime Member David Salem's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Stu Bowie View Post
    Hi Dave, this is simply amazing. I havent seen this pose from a HB coming in to feed, and great DOF and sharpness all over. I prefer your OP with regards to the detail, and dont feel its over sharpened or too bright.

    Well, this would sure be an early runner for IOTY 2018, but sadly you cant qualify, but I'm sure you could enter it elsewhere.
    Thanks Stu!! Glad you like it. I did think of entering it in a contest in the future so I will keep you posted!.
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    BPN Member William Dickson's Avatar
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    I seen this one, this morning on my laptop, and thought it was looking good even though I had to scroll to see the full image. Now, looking on the 27 5K iMac it is looking even better... amazing image Dave. I prefer the original, its looking perfect on my screen. I've also noticed that what we see on the 5K, others on different monitors, see it brighter, and some say, the whites are slightly blown, when they look, and measure good, on the 5K.

    Getting back to the image, I love that pose, the colours are beautiful, throughout. The flowers give a great colour boost. BG is perfect for the colours on the bird. Great crop. Perfect..

    Well done and TFS

    Will

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    Late to the party, congratulations Dave, this has the WOWSA factor, what an unique frame, you got skills my friend!

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    Beautiful Unique Image.

    I love the clean background and dynamic pose.

    Thanks for sharing.

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    Great image of the hummer that I refer to as the Violent Sabrewing. I had one at the finca that would fly within an inch of my nose and hover there staring me down. He was a bully at the feeders and I would have to kick him out by standing next to the feeder and let the others come in. They all have their own personalities and it's a joy to be around them. I hope you have more images to share.

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    Lifetime Member David Salem's Avatar
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    William Dickson wrote: "I've also noticed that what we see on the 5K, others on different monitors, see it brighter, and some say, the whites are slightly blown, when they look, and measure good, on the 5K."


    Thanks William,

    Yes I have seen the same scenario. Might be how we have out monitors brightness set or for some reason the IMac 5K isn't quite as bright. Whatever it is, I love the detail and color reproduction of my monitor.
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    Lifetime Member David Salem's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Crosswell View Post
    Great image of the hummer that I refer to as the Violent Sabrewing. I had one at the finca that would fly within an inch of my nose and hover there staring me down. He was a bully at the feeders and I would have to kick him out by standing next to the feeder and let the others come in. They all have their own personalities and it's a joy to be around them. I hope you have more images to share.
    Pretty funny Jim. Perfect name for these guys! Not that we would have done it, but we contemplated using a BB gun on this little demon We had to stand in different spots to try to block him so we could get another hummer in to the flowers. Unreal how fast and agile these guys are when they chase each other. He must have used a gallon of sugar water that day protecting his feeders. We missed a lot of nice species because of him too
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    Lifetime Member Doug Brown's Avatar
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    Probably the most dynamic hummingbird pose I've ever seen Dave! These birds are so fast that you don't usually know what kind of poses you got during a shoot until you review them on your computer. I can only imaging how excited you were to see this image on your computer screen for the first time! Congrats!
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