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Thread: Kea - New Zealand endemic

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    Default Kea - New Zealand endemic

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    This is the world's only alpine parrot. The species is endemic to New Zealand and - like many of the country's birds - rapidly declining. The are quite intelligent
    and mischievous, and they will often land on cars to play with antenna and roof racks.

    I know this frame is FAR from perfect. It would not have been kept were it of any other bird, but this was a really desired species on my trip (life bird #2,070). Sadly, I can't just walk down to the local pond and try again on this one! Overhead and diffuse, the lighting SUCKED on my only day in appropriate habitat, and I have done quite bit of local exposure control on the head to get it where it is now. I also applied more sharpening than usual, and I performed selective NR on the background. It just felt I had to push the sliders around a lot on this one.

    So, given all that, I am curious what people think. A decent salvage or total rubbish?

    Canon 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 IS II on EOS 1DX Mark II
    1/1250 at f/5.6, ISO 1600

    Cheers,
    Dorian

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    Congrats on your efforts Dorian, and way above a "decent salvage" in my book. A beautiful parrot and on a pleasing rock although i would clean up the "obvious" Sharp poppin eye, and HA is great. Enjoy this frame, you did very well given what you had...

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    I like the pose, complimentary BG and perch. When bike touring NZ back in 97/98 I had to make sure these guys didn't chew up my saddle at Arthur's Pass. Thanks for posting this one Dorian.

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    I think that it is a fine image: wonderful pose and posture, soft light, perfect head angle, the tail away from the perch, and I think that the rock perch is quite complimentary to the subject.

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    I think you did well, I'd would be very happy with this image. The bird and rock perch are quite wonderful. Thank you for sharing, Dorian.
    Joe Przybyla

    "Sometimes I do get to places just as God is ready to have somebody click the shutter"... Ansel Adams

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    Looks good to me. Like the bird on the rock perch. The background color and the birds color compliment one another very well.

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    BPN Member Tim Foltz's Avatar
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    Dorian,
    Sweet image, I would be happy with that considering the conditions you spoke of, sharp, nice pose, HA and colors.
    I'm still waiting on the book my friend, you know the one we talked about last time at SJWS.

    -Tim

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    Hey Dorian,
    I hope you enjoyed your travels and managed to get at least some of the endemic species in New Zealand. I'm going to have to check out your blog.
    I like pretty much everything about the image - posture, head angle, image quality looks pretty good to me.
    The only thing that doesn't look quite right to me is the colour. I think the bird is overall a little bright - I expect the greens duller and darker, more toward olive green/khaki and the breast and neck feathers also darker, less straw coloured.
    I think the Kea is an amazing bird, and I'm really pleased to see this one here.
    Gerald

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