Another Ruddy Duck

[Ed Vatza]

Female. Winter Plumage. North Shore (NJ).

Canon 50D; 300mm f/2.8L IS w/2x TC; Tripod-mounted

1/250 sec @ f/5.6; ISO 200; +1/3 EV; Sunny WB; FL 600mm (EFL 960mm)

[Daniel Cadieux]

Exposure, sharpness, and swimming-towards-you angle are all good - as is the smooth mirror-like water. Ed, I again see a cast in this image...leaning on the magenta side again too.

[Tony Whitehead]

Nice calm image, Ed. I agree with Dan's on the magenta cast. How does this version look? (slight move away from magenta and less so in yellow in midtone and highlights colour balance layer in PS4)

[Juan Aragonés]

I agree with the previous comments and would like to add another thing: toning down the Bg to made the bird popup would produce a better result IMO. BTW, terrific eye contact!

[Ed Vatza]

Thank you all for your feedback/critiques. Always much appreciated.

I must offer a big mea culpa here. After the magenta cast comments regarding my Eurasian Wigeon post from earlier in the week, I went back and redid several images backing off on the WB and Tint in Lightroom. Then when I posted this Ruddy image, I posted the earlier version instead of the redo. I'm not sure it is as good as Tony's but here is my version that I meant to post.

[Robert O'Toole]

Hi Ed,

I really like the image, sharp, great water and nice light. The water droplets make great details.

Agree with the reddish cast to the water. Not sure if my version looks realistic to you but I opened curves and dragged the red channel down just slightly to pull out the reds. Then I darkened the water and left the duck as is.

Robert

[Arthur Morris]

Wow, everyone is getting in the color balance game. I used Robert's average blur trick and came up with this which I think will look similar to his version. Tony's repost looked too cyan to me.

[Grace Scalzo]

I see that Ed is shooting with a 50D as am I and I'm having troubles with color casts as well. Anyone else?

[Arthur Morris]

Hey Grace, When I use mine I am pretty much loving the color.