Whimbrel III

[arash_hazeghi]

Another whimbrel shot from several weeks ago. This one was taken a bit earlier in the day with the sun not quite as low in the sky but the I like the dangling feet and the beach habitat consisting of sand and pickleweed sprinkled with some wild flower.

shot with a-1 and 200-600 zoom 600mm f/6.3 1/4000 sec ISO-800 handheld processed with C1P.

[Wayne Niz]

Hey Arash,

An overall pleasing image, although the foot has sharpness, there is a lack of detail in the eye area bordering on it being a soft, not sure if this is an issue with the lens or just focus. The BG is awesome, but overall an image we have all seen countless times before. You are such a talent as seen in your work but I think you do not push yourself hard enough when you produce a picture that tells no story or leaves the viewer with no emotional response. Push your boundaries we all know you can produce a sharp side BIF image give us more...

[Kurt Bowman]

I like this and don't see any issues in seeing a lot of BIF images. Especially when they are well done. I don't think the eye is soft, it looks fine on my screen.

[Joseph Przybyla]

Yup, your usual high quality image. I also like the dangling feet and the wing positions. Thank you for sharing, Ari.

[arash_hazeghi]

Hey Arash,

An overall pleasing image, although the foot has sharpness, there is a lack of detail in the eye area bordering on it being a soft, not sure if this is an issue with the lens or just focus. The BG is awesome, but overall an image we have all seen countless times before. You are such a talent as seen in your work but I think you do not push yourself hard enough when you produce a picture that tells no story or leaves the viewer with no emotional response. Push your boundaries we all know you can produce a sharp side BIF image give us more...

Hi Wayne thanks for the critique

the image is certainly tack sharp in the eye. Not sure why you can’t tell like others do. Unlike the canon gear the Sony never misses the focus at least in my hands and the lens is sharp too. I am sorry you did see the story here. Every bird has one ;) I for one am not in the business of making mediocre images and then passing them as a story or emotions like the ones with side light soft head, flat wings or angled away from us, anyone can take those :)

An image of a common bird taken in good light, with sharp details, dynamic wing position and an attractive BG tops a mediocre image of an exotic bird in my book. The latter is not avian photography IMO and a bird watching forum might a better place to share and enjoy those kinds of images. just my 2 cents.

[arash_hazeghi]

Thanks guys

[Wayne Niz]

Hi Wayne thanks for the critique

the image is certainly tack sharp in the eye. Not sure why you can’t tell like others do. Unlike the canon gear the Sony never misses the focus at least in my hands and the lens is sharp too. I am sorry you did see the story here. Every bird has one ;) I for one am not in the business of making mediocre images and then passing them as a story or emotions like the ones with side light soft head, flat wings or angled away from us, anyone can take those :)

An image of a common bird taken in good light, with sharp details, dynamic wing position and an attractive BG tops a mediocre image of an exotic bird in my book. The latter is not avian photography IMO and a bird watching forum might a better place to share and enjoy those kinds of images. just my 2 cents.

Hey Arash,

Sorry that you seem to have gotten really emotional about my critique, I am sorry but on my screen the foot is tack sharp and the eye is not. Not sure you really understand the emotive response that good art produces, a tack sharp image complying with all your technical adjudication requirements does not necessarily represent a good artistic image, nor does an image just tell a story you have to work harder than that. Please google the best ranked bird photographs year on year and see how many pass your technical approval criteria - not many do... As a beginner I am happy to take the critique and try to develop my skills as time goes - is the image that I have presented of such a low standard that it does not belong on this site well I take that as your emotions talking, its not the greatest I agree but at least I'm trying to present something different.

I was serious about my appreciation of your skill, you really are a craftsman with a camera technically, but with this skill you can do so much more as I said. There was a pic posted on this forum a few months back titled "Dont look back" maybe if you view that picture you will understand my point.

If I am totally off the mark and this site is only for technical accuracy of set criteria from this site, well then I am in the wrong place as this is obviously a very one dimensional view...

[arash_hazeghi]

Hey Arash,

Sorry that you seem to have gotten really emotional about my critique, I am sorry but on my screen the foot is tack sharp and the eye is not. Not sure you really understand the emotive response that good art produces, a tack sharp image complying with all your technical adjudication requirements does not necessarily represent a good artistic image, nor does an image just tell a story you have to work harder than that. Please google the best ranked bird photographs year on year and see how many pass your technical approval criteria - not many do... As a beginner I am happy to take the critique and try to develop my skills as time goes - is the image that I have presented of such a low standard that it does not belong on this site well I take that as your emotions talking, its not the greatest I agree but at least I'm trying to present something different.

I was serious about my appreciation of your skill, you really are a craftsman with a camera technically, but with this skill you can do so much more as I said. There was a pic posted on this forum a few months back titled "Dont look back" maybe if you view that picture you will understand my point.

If I am totally off the mark and this site is only for technical accuracy of set criteria from this site, well then I am in the wrong place as this is obviously a very one dimensional view...

Hi Wayne

no offenses taken, I just wanted to address your critique.

Not sure why the image looks different on your side, monitor could be a factor, non familiarity with the bird could be another factor as I have said before. As it looks tack sharp on my calibrated 32" 4K reference NEC monitor, there is no adjustment necessary to make on my side. I don't want to say the obvious, but I do find your vulture images with the exception of the head shot-that was great- somewhat soft and lacking in fine details on my large screen and apparantly I have a good eye for sharpness according to Artie The fact that you are sometimes using a Canon 600 II with the 2X III TC which I had for a decade and by no means find that sharp tells me you have not yet mastered the sharpness criteria. I am sure you will very soon if you stick around.

As far as Google ranking of images I could care less, half of what you see in the internet is fake or heavily processed junk. Those kind of image have no value to me. Anyone placed accidentally in front of a unique and unusal scene can make a half-*** blurry underexposed image and win some contests too...still a load of junk IMO even if it's on the first page of CNN.com

we welcome any image on this forum and we provide real critique. What I was pointing out that this site is not the best place to present what I call "artistic junk" and expect a pat on the back. that's why you pay to become a member, to receive honest non BS critique to better at making avian photographs whether just documenting natural history or tell a unique story . some can't take it and leave. I hope you stay


and by no means what I posted is a contest winning unique shot. But I feel it severs as an example of a descent flight shot especially in terms of details abs sharpness. I don’t think it’s that dull but If you think it’s boring and repetitive that’s a valid critique and Thanks for that.


best

[Wayne Niz]

Hey Arash,

Thanks for the heads-up on the TC2 iii will definitely do a couple tests on that and for sure I have not mastered a thing yet only been doing this for a couple months now. Not to labor the point but just for my sanity would it be possible to post a 100% crop of the eye?

I will be sticking around for sure as I think this is an awesome platform to learn from others.

Thanks again for your valued input

Cheers (Oh and by the way I think Sony is awesome I had a PlayStation and it gave me hours of fun)

[arash_hazeghi]

Hi
Wayne shoot me your email I will send you something that you might find useful.

cheers.

[Dorian Anderson]

Looks really good, Arash. Fully-thrown near wing is very nice. I agree the dangling foot is a highlight. And yes, light is a little steeper than ideal, but workable nonetheless. Would like a touch more head turn, but that's really minor against the dynamic pose.

[dankearl]

I like the non ocean BG because it is different. Great flight pose and feet a plus.. I don't think it is your sharpest frame end to end you have posted
but that is a high bar. If it were your sharpest and best, you would stop doing this, always a better shot...

[arash_hazeghi]

I like the non ocean BG because it is different. Great flight pose and feet a plus.. I don't think it is your sharpest frame end to end you have posted
but that is a high bar. If it were your sharpest and best, you would stop doing this, always a better shot...

thanks Dan,

Not true, this is no more or less sharp than the ones I have posted before for sure. The light was a bit high which doesn't give as much micro contrast on the feathers like the ones I posted earlier.

It might be hard to imagine, but once you move to Sony the sharpness totally goes out of the equation. It's not like the SDLR where the sharpness varies from shot to shot and and there is no such thing as the sharpest frame anymore...ALL the frames are equally sharp if the users knows what they are doing. The only way to better the image is trying to get a more interesting BG, interactions etc.

cheers

[arash_hazeghi]

Hey Arash,

Thanks for the heads-up on the TC2 iii will definitely do a couple tests on that and for sure I have not mastered a thing yet only been doing this for a couple months now. Not to labor the point but just for my sanity would it be possible to post a 100% crop of the eye?

I will be sticking around for sure as I think this is an awesome platform to learn from others.

Thanks again for your valued input

Cheers (Oh and by the way I think Sony is awesome I had a PlayStation and it gave me hours of fun)

here is a 100% un-sharpened crop from RAW, if you have a sharper file of a whimbrel in flight by with a zoom lens by all means show me please

the original was also underexposed by accident which I lifted

[arash_hazeghi]

from comparison this is a 100% crop from RAW from this image I posted a while back. On my reference NEC screen the sharpness looks about equal to my eye but the light in the other one was lower which gives it more micro-contrast and a stronger punch. I consider this pretty tack sharp for a $2K zoom lens. If it were with my 600 f/4 GM it would be a touch sharper but not by much....

http://www.birdphotographers.net/for...-color-palette

[arash_hazeghi]

there were only two birds that flew the whole evening. In both cases bird eye AF locked on the eye tracking the bird beautifully on the beach with heat shimmers etc. I could never dream of this before, almost static-shot level of sharpness at 50 mega pixel with a $2K zoom lens . with my other rigs this would have been a waste of time and nothing but a dreamy soft image to delete.

[John Mack]

Very nice. Really dig the wings on this one.

"As far as Google ranking of images I could care less, half of what you see in the internet is fake or heavily processed junk. Those kind of image have no value to me. Anyone placed accidentally in front of a unique and unusal scene can make a half-*** blurry underexposed image and win some contests too...still a load of junk IMO even if it's on the first page of CNN.com"

Got a good laugh out of that line.