Australian Magpie

[Colin Driscoll]

A female Australian Magpie taking a couple of morsels, spider and millipede, to its young one.
Canon EOS R5 EF 600 f4 HH
1/6400 f5.6 iso6400
ACR PS2023

[Jack Backs]

Nice wing position. There appears to be a halo around the prey item. Too bad there wasn't better light, noise reduction has softened a lot of the feather detail.
I'm not sure how fast these birds fly but dropping the shutter speed and iso may have helped.

[Jonathan Ashton]

Colin I would certainly look again at the NR, I sense a good image has been taken but the image has that plastic look about it.

[Dorian Anderson]

Action and background are sweet, but I agree with the others re: the halo around the prey item and the plastic look due to NR.

I would have been at 1/3200 and ISO 3200 to save myself a stop of noise.

[William Dickson]

Got to agree. It is worth processing again Colin. The insect in the bill is so sharp compared to the bird, especially the bill and head area. Looks like you got detail in the blacks/whites but NR has hidden it. Great flight pose and BG. Definitely worth a revisit.

Will

[Colin Driscoll]

Thanks you for the comments. Unfortunately it is a lost cause because there just wasn't enough light to bring any detail out in the blacks. Such difficult birds to get a good shot of.
It's not a halo around the prey, just a lighter patch in the BG that I should have cleaned up.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Colin ... a cool shot with the prey as a nice bonus .
Sadly it has two major issues for me ... plastic look and choked blacks . Killing it for me as presented .
Maybe try to rework it les heavy handed .

TFS Andreas

[Steve Kaluski]

1/6400 f5.6 iso6400

What was the EV here Colin?

Unfortunately it is a lost cause because there just wasn't enough light to bring any detail out in the blacks. Such difficult birds to get a good shot of.

Firstly Colin, you should have changed the Metering and just instantly dialled in to plus the EV to +2 and always shoot Auto ISO. You might have slightly blown some off the whites, but achieved more detail in the Shadows/Blacks, expose for the subject and with those setting you would have nailed the shot. Conversely pre set one of the back buttons with some basic backlit setting, or input them into C1-3 setting where you just turn a dial and shoot, great for on the fly shooting.

As noted the NR is way too aggressive concealing the detail and so, even stripping away some of the issues there is detail, especially in the whites, Blacks are clipped as presented.

Maybe try to rework it les heavy handed .

Worth it.

[jack williamson]

The blacks and whites are nice but it is not as sharp as it could be.