I am not so proud of this picture and I don't consider it art either. I just thought I should post it coz I don't know if these birds are often seen in others countries. maybe it will be the first time for some of you.
The story is I was home watching TV and I heard some loud bird noises outside. I looked out through the window and I saw around 20 birds flying all over the place. Birds I had never seen before.... I just put a coat over my pajamas and went to the garage to get my equipment. I climbed a little hill behind my house and waited. Finally this guy came by and I got him. They were all gone the next day. It was a bit dark already. There was not much I could do. Now I will be waiting for next year to see if they come back.
I tried to clean up the BG. I am afraid it is too obvious! Also I had to recover the darks in the head to be able to see the eyes. You might see some kind of a halo in the head. The reason of under exposing the shadows was because I keep making a mistake. Some how in my head when I want to compensate I think RIGHT=more light. Nikon cameras you go right and the EV goes negative. So I took the shot at EV-0.7 when I wanted to shoot at +0.7. Ah well!
Beautiful bird and good eye contact. I might increase contrast and remove the little branch. The area around the eye looks somewhat lighter than the rest of the head.
Thanks for sharing a bird that I've not seen before. Sharpness is great, and so is the pose. The area around the eye looks a little overprocessed and has a greenish color to it. I would probably clone out the branch behind the bird.
That part around the eye is what I was talking about. Sometimes I am just afraid to retouched too much. Well, I just did. I hope it works for you guys!
DOUG... I had you in mind when I said maybe there was someone who hasn't seen it before! I am glad you like it!
Lovely bird new to pretty much everyone. Repost is better but I like my trunk sculpting a lot better here. Let me know how the face/eye looks; I did LOTS of work on this one. It was worth the effort.
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Hi Artie! Your "trunk sculpting" definitely looks better! You are an artist all the way, huh!? I googled this bird and seems they have it in Portugal and some places over in Europe. Thank you for all the work.... I like it! The only thing is the eye.... uhmmm! The eye looks like on the original post again... I was so mad when I noticed I had taken the shot at EV-0.7. Well, now I have to wait a year to see if they come back next winter. Cheers!
Azure-winged Magpie
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