Red-winged Blackbird

[Bob DeCroce]

Not having much luck getting close to the birds lately...

This beauty dropped in right in front of me, sun directly behind me, about ten feet away.

A9II, 200-600 1/640 at f/8.0, ISO 3200. FF, slight adj whites and blacks in LR.
Patch tool removed additional branches, DeNoise AI BG, subject unsharp mask in PS.

[David Roach]

Beautiful perch, calling pose and high contrast view against dramatic BG. You nailed the face and that shoulder patch. Wonderful canvas if a little tight on sides. I love it. TFS

ps
Do not miss details in the blocked blacks at all.

[dankearl]

I like it... Cool almost falling pose they have at times. I also don't care that much about blocked blacks
on a blackbird.

[Colin Driscoll]

Good action shot. Most of the shadows don't seem to be blocked and the image would benefit with bringing more out of those areas.

[Brian Sump]

Bob, not an easy shot... at least for me.

Seems like there's a good bit of blues in the black on my screen - on top and even in the feet and branches.

TFS.

[arash_hazeghi]

I like the calling pose and the BG, I do wish the wing position was more dynamic. Parts of the perch a bit cluttered for my taste. some of the blacks are indeed blocked with no details but it is not too bad and maybe you can pull out just a bit more details so that it isn't totally blocked. the blue cast on the primaries is reflection from the sky, can be reduced ... good job getting close with the zoom!

TFS

[Daniel Cadieux]

I like the typical RWB calling pose. The blackest blacks could indeed be lifted (especially under the top wing), but they are still mostly OK to me. Nice perch. Sharp, and the epaulettes look great. yes to the blue cast - sliding the blue channel down in hue/saturation to the whole image should do the trick just fine here. I do feel that zooming out would have given the subject a bit more room to breath with this relatively tight comp. Nicely done overall!

[Bob DeCroce]

Thank you all for the comments and suggestions!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

[Bob DeCroce]

I like the typical RWB calling pose. The blackest blacks could indeed be lifted (especially under the top wing), but they are still mostly OK to me. Nice perch. Sharp, and the epaulettes look great. yes to the blue cast - sliding the blue channel down in hue/saturation to the whole image should do the trick just fine here. I do feel that zooming out would have given the subject a bit more room to breath with this relatively tight comp. Nicely done overall!

Dan thanks for the input and especially the simple tweak for removing the blue cast. Also opened up the blacks a bit, and expanded the canvas a little too.

[John Mack]

A well done classic red wing calling frame. Perch is right on for this bird. Nice view of those red wings as well.

[Jay Ing]

Very nice. I've struggled to get a good shot of these loud mouths. Personally find getting the blacks to play back nicely a challenge. Well done.