Yay or go away?

[Brian Sump]

Went to a local pond where some Wood Ducks reside to capture the amazing fall colors on the water.

Came away with some nice traditional frames but then ran across this one and found it quite different. It had natural vignette/framing from a subject right in front of my lens (in the bottom 1/3) and shadows behind.

Took a bit of a unique approach. Do you resonate with it or nay?

R5
840mm
Handheld at water level
ISO 5000
1/2000
f5.6

LR and PS. Evicted a couple bright white spots. The whites on the neck were close to blown so not much to salvage unfortunately.

[Joseph Przybyla]

Hi Brian, quite a striking image, I like it a lot. I have a few closeups of Wood Ducks but have processed differently, this image gives me ideas to try. Nice image, thank you for sharing.

[Randy Stout]

Brian:

The spot light effect is very dramatic, highlighting the great colors and texture of the feathers. Framing is effective

The whites are unfortunate, but with this lighting the exposure was obviously a real challenge.

Always great to see different treatments of the subject.

Cheers

Randy

[Paul Burdett]

Hi Brian. This one works for me, and I don't even mind the whites here. Stunning colours indeed. TFS

[Daniel Cadieux]

It works for me as well. When we end up with so many images of a certain species it's nice to come a cross an opportunity that will yield something different. These guys' whites on the face can be a nightmare at times - and on top of the bill as well, but it looks perfect here.

[Jonathan Ashton]

Interesting image but overall a little dark for my taste, perhaps a little less saturation and a small boost to the darks.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Brian .... what a striking prtrait !!!!
A great idea to capture this scene and try to get something good out of it .
I am ok with the darkish areas showing no details , but what bothers me and is a " no go " are the featuer less blown white areas . Oooooooh i wish you would have been able to get details visible in these areas......

Always worth to try and think OOTB

TFS Andreas

[kevin Hice]

Wow this is really nice Brian. I love it always like that contrast with a dark background. One striking image and different which is nice. I know the whites are a little hot. My only negative I would rather see the bright white under the cheek patch. I see the whites greyed out. Spotlight is right on. TFS

[William Dickson]

Works for me Brian....something different is always eye catching and it works here....The detail on the eye and surrounding area looks real good in that light...I like how the light fades and ends up dark at the bottom....Well captured and processed...

Will

[arash_hazeghi]

I like this one, but it has a bit too much contrast for me, the blacks are a bit too flat. I recently switched to an OLED monitor which can render the deepest blacks and expose the "blocked blacks" issue so I might be too picky . This is one of those images where HDR1000 encoding would make a difference but sadly it won't be easily sharable on this forum.

TFS