Eurasian Jay (Garrulus glandarius)

[Jonathan Ashton]

Taken from my garden hide. I know I could have blended the background some and I did but I prefer this undoctored version, I feel it looks more natural and it is certainly more reflective of circumstance.
Olympus E-M1X
Focal Length : 212.0mm
Focal length in 35 mm film : 425.0mm
Exposure mode : Manual exposure
ISO: 2000
Exposure compensation : 0.0 EV
Exposure program : Manual
Shutter : 1/640 sec
Aperture : F5.6


ACR/PSCC

[Volkan Akgul]

hi Jon,
Clarity is very good for me. The bird is beautiful. The background is a bit tiring.
Congratulations.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Jon ... nice one .
I do like the shoulder look of the Jay .
Nice warm colors and the fine detail looks good as well !!!!
I am really liking the mottled BG ... albeit some will say it is too cluttered ... I rather prefer varieties of color and the tonal spectrum is not too far apart .
I might add a bit of " fill flash " .... to make the Jay shine a bit more .

TFS Andreas

[Jonathan Ashton]

Thanks Volkan, Andreas "I might add a bit of " fill flash " .... to make the Jay shine a bit more ."
Yes I have been doing a little fill flash at higher ISO to see if I can get decent results.

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Jon, a bit of fill-in would be nice, hopefully it won't spoke the Jay, but might just give that little bit of 'pop' especially to the face. Personally I find the crop, not ideal, a sliver off the top and a tad more on the LHS I feel will offer a better presentation. Overall you have some nice, authentic colours and the look back is nice too. I like the idea of having texture to the perch, (albeit I think you could tease out some more detail) set against the mottled backdrop, although I'm not a lover of the top RHC, I think it needs to be similar for continuity, but that's just me.

TFS
Steve

[Andreas Liedmann]

I was talking about " fill flash in post " .... will not spook the Jay

[Dorian Anderson]

Pose and stare are great. I think the bird could be moved up and slightly right in the frame; bird needs more room behind the tail. I hear the comments about artificial fill flash; throwing even 1/4 - 1/3 stop of light on the face/head would help draw out attention there while simultaneously revealing additional feather detail.

[William Dickson]

Nice one Jon...Less crop I reckon may be worth looking at.....All else looks good here....

Will