Note: The sun was coming in very harshly from my left side; not the best conditions but I hand only one opportunity in making the capture, because I wanted to include his shadow in the composition. I compensated by dialing the exposure to –1.0EV.
This little guy was walking up and down the shore line, early one morning at Estero Beach, in Fort Myers Florida, looking for a bite to eat. He was painted with a Nikon D200, using a Nikkor AF-S 300mm f/4D IF-ED lens , and a Nikkor 1.4 T/C
Image solution: focal length @ 630mm / exposure mode @ aperture priority / in camera matrix metering / ISO @ 200 / 1/1750sec. - f/5.6 / white balance @ cloudy / AF - mode @ dynamic range, auto - continuous / color space @ sRGB / lighting solution - no speedlight, ambient light / exposure comp @ -1.0EV / tone comp @ +1 degree / hue adjustment @ +2 degrees / saturation factor @ +2 degrees / support platform - no tripod, hand held, flat on belly /
Very nice Gus. Good exposure and pose. Like the shadow and raised foot. The bird looks a bit oversharpened to me particularly on the head as there's a strong halo.
Agree that the shadow is a good addition to the composition. I guess because of the light, the bird's color seem too saturated or perhaps it is the slight over-sharpening that Chris mentioned.
This is indeed a very nice image, has a lovely feel to it.
Cheers
Gail
Hi Gus - good job in the harsh light - do like the included shadow - dont know whether its oversharpened or its just the harsh side light.
:) Just goes to show even if the light is not coming from were you want it - it's still worth getting some practice in and trying something a little different to see if you can come up with something that works.
Nice composition and bird. Agree on the sharpening comments above.
To avoid the halo you could create a mask only on the edges and then
sharpen only the masked (actually not-masked:)) edges. IMHO there's
no need to sharpen relatively large flat areas.
"Just Looking"
