"Motif: Holiday spirit - "I'm dreaming of a white.... nestbox?"

[Richard Stern]

A rather unhappy looking Flicker on one of our backyard boxes during a storm the other day.

D300, Nikon 80-400, hand-held through the kitchen window. ISO 800, 1/400, f8.0, cropped, some curves and sharpening adjustments.

Merry Xmas!

Richard

[Gus Cobos]

Hi Richard,
I love the image and capture. The mood and feel is very nice. I suggest cloning out the two snow flakes on the bird's eye and reconstructing it...well presented...congrats...:cool:

[denise ippolito]

Richard, that's a nice winter scene- the snow looks so good in BG- Gus' idea sounds good Merry Christmas

[Alfred Forns]

Hi Richard can add would like to see more room particularly to the top Love the captured feel !!!

[Desmond Chan]

I also like the feel of this photo. And I find the colors look quite natural. I would be tempted to crop a bit off the left though.

[Nonda Surratt]

I don't think he'll fit:D

Love the snow, makes for a very nice scene. Agree with Gus on the eye and adding a bit to the top. There looks to be some rope on one side and a chain on the other I might get rid of.

Love the feel!

[Richard Stern]

Hi everyone, and thanks for your comments. One thing that I am slowly learning (too slowly I think) is to pay more attention to the detail that isn't the main subject, and can therefore easily be missed - such as the rope and chain (belonging to feeders) at the edges of the original post, and the exact positioning of the main subject in the frame. Those things can often make or break an image, so would that be worth a sticky, or a comment in the Educational Resources forum?

Thanks again,

Richard

[Nonda Surratt]

I am slowly learning (too slowly I think) is to pay more attention to the detail that isn't the main subject, and can therefore easily be missed>>>

Good luck with that Richard!:D Much easier for someone else to see such stuff than the person that made the image me thinks. I miss whoppers! Sometimes I'll just get off an image for an hour then come back to it, with how in the world did I miss that!:eek:

Looks better w/o the chain and rope.

[Jackie Schuknecht]

Hi Richard, like Gus' suggestion about removing the snowflakes which you did. I might be tempted to boost the contrast thru curves up a bit or add blacks thru selective colour to the neutrals. Maybe the saturation a wee bit too. Love the feel of this one too, feels like you are right in the middle of the scene with the snow.