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Thread: Short-eared Owl

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    Default Short-eared Owl

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    Captured this image a few days ago at a local grassland preserve in the late afternoon. Please excuse the pixelation / artifacts in the background. I'm still trying to determine what is causing this. If anyone has suggestions it would be much appreciated. I'm finding it starts with the camera NEF file, then when looking at it in Capture NX-D it shows clearly. It becomes progressively worse or defined as I take it into ACR, then save for the web, it becomes what you see posted here.

    D500, Nikon 500mm f 4/G + 1.4 TC, 1/640s, f 5.6, ISO 2000, Gitzo, Wimberley Gimbal head.


    Geoffrey




    http://500px.com/geoffreymontagu

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    Hello Geoffrey, this is a beautiful bird. But the pasteurization and the light is not helping you here. I see no feather details on my monitor. Was this a big crop? Looks like you raised the shadows too much also and the IQ suffered a lot, I would remove the white thing from the top of the tail. TFS.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Juan Tolentino View Post
    Hello Geoffrey, this is a beautiful bird. But the pasteurization and the light is not helping you here. I see no feather details on my monitor. Was this a big crop? Looks like you raised the shadows too much also and the IQ suffered a lot, I would remove the white thing from the top of the tail. TFS.
    Thanks Juan. About 70% of FF. I added more DE. There was no raising of the shadows. Thanks for pointing out the white thing on the tail. These owls have very fine / smooth feathers.Name:  ©-2019-Geoffrey-Montagu_DSC1593ar_01-Pole-Farm-SEOW.jpg
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    Geoffrey




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    Hi Geoff, I am envious that you were able to get relatively close. But you are having the same problems on this file as you are on the Harrier. Image quality is not good at all. I have found that very dark and the deep green backgrounds cause this type of issue. It gets worse when downsized and when you apply NR to background. Not sure there is a fix other than shoot in better light which I am aware does not help in this situation. Aside for the background, the bird is soft and lacks fine feather details. Don't think 1/640 was enough speed to produce a sharp image. I was able to get sharp images at 1/1600 of these guys but not many. Did much much better at 1/3200. Of course I had the light to be able to shoot that fast but the results were almost all tack sharp images.

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    Lifetime Member gail bisson's Avatar
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    I have to agree that the IQ just isn't there. I think you needed a higher SS.
    The wing position is great. I would move the owl back in the frame.
    I love the BG colors and all of us have issues with posterization with these dark green BG's. I sometimes try Gaussian blur- sometimes it works and other times it doesn't.
    Gail

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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    Great bird and pose but as above, the IQ and SH are lacking.

    with love, artie

    ps: do you use Capture One?
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    Geoff,
    Not sure what is going on, you are a solid photographer and the last 2 images have real problems.
    I have no idea what your workflow is and posting images is not that difficult.
    I just resize images in PS to 1600 lg. direction, add a touch of sharpening, save at about 10 and you are
    under 600 and still have nice quality.
    Hope this does not come across as condescending..
    Dan Kearl

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    Hi Geoffrey, beautiful bird but I have to agree with others that the IQ is not there. Not sure what could be happening I have never had this problem with my D500. Thank you for sharing.
    Joe Przybyla

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    Nice owl agree with what has already been said here.

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    I have observed this issue when I was using Lightroom with dark green and greyish background. I did not test this with other softwares

    I agree that the image quality is not there but it is a good start.

    Hope you get another one in good light

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    Thank you all for your observations and technical suggestions. With the field tests I've done it seems to be isolated to one body.

    Isaac, your points are spot on, but when you said, "Not sure there is a fix other than shooting in better light which I am aware does not help in this situation.", the first thought I had was I like shooting in bright overcast, rain, snow, etc. and never seeing this issue before with any camera.

    Gail, your comment, "I sometimes try Gaussian blur-sometimes it works and other times it doesn't." I tried it with no luck.

    Artie, No I don't use Capture One. The only issue I have with Capture NX-D is it's slow.

    Dan, By no means is your input condescending, on the contrary it's helpful.

    Joe, This has not happened in any of the other bodies I've owned. I'm not sure what's going on either.

    John, Thanks.

    Krishna, as some have indicated this happens with the green, dark green, in some of my images with grayish background as well. In my recollection it's not happened with these conditions before.

    Thanks again everyone very much, and I'm sure there will be a fix.


    Geoffrey




    http://500px.com/geoffreymontagu

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    I have had this issue with all 3 of my Canon bodies, the 7d2, 1dx and 1dx2. Have not shot enough shots with the d850 yet but I am sure the issue will come up again as well. Maybe Arash can answer with specifics as to why it happens. I just know it does happen on very dark backgrounds or very dark and very green backgrounds. So it is more prone to happen in off light. I have a really pretty photo of a hermit thrush that I took this spring where the bird is spotlighted in full warm sun and the background is almost entirely dark and shaded. Had the same issue with it and never posted it. I do not think it is an issue specific to your camera but of course that is just speculation.

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    I like the mood but the image quality is very poor. it's not just the BG posterization but the whole bird is just soft and lacking. The problem is trying to save a small JPEG file with Nikon capture NX. Nikon Capture software cannot compress the files well, it is trashing them by too much compression. you need to use Adobe Photoshop to save JPEG's for the web. Overall I find Nikon Capture NX-D to be a useless software, it renders the colors nicely but the files look crunchy and grainy and it is so slow....


    TFS
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    Quote Originally Posted by arash_hazeghi View Post
    I like the mood but the image quality is very poor. it's not just the BG posterization but the whole bird is just soft and lacking. The problem is trying to save a small JPEG file with Nikon capture NX. Nikon Capture software cannot compress the files well, it is trashing them by too much compression. you need to use Adobe Photoshop to save JPEG's for the web. Overall I find Nikon Capture NX-D to be a useless software, it renders the colors nicely but the files look crunchy and grainy and it is so slow....


    TFS

    Thanks Arash. I only use Capture NX-D to run through the images. From there into ACR, and edit in Adobe Photoshop and saving the JPEG's for the web from PS. As I had indicated, I've not seen this issue before.

    Geoffrey




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    Quote Originally Posted by Isaac Grant View Post
    I have had this issue with all 3 of my Canon bodies, the 7d2, 1dx and 1dx2. Have not shot enough shots with the d850 yet but I am sure the issue will come up again as well. Maybe Arash can answer with specifics as to why it happens. I just know it does happen on very dark backgrounds or very dark and very green backgrounds. So it is more prone to happen in off light. I have a really pretty photo of a hermit thrush that I took this spring where the bird is spotlighted in full warm sun and the background is almost entirely dark and shaded. Had the same issue with it and never posted it. I do not think it is an issue specific to your camera but of course that is just speculation.
    Thanks for adding this, Isaac. If this issue has occurred in the past, I don't recall and or it was so slight it disappeared in the workflow. Speaking of which I tried to fix with Gaussian blur to no avail. As I've said before when I've had the backgrounds you mention here, they are a smooth gradation of whatever colors there are.

    Geoffrey




    http://500px.com/geoffreymontagu

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