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Thread: Red-winged Blackbird

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    Default Red-winged Blackbird

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    EOS-1D Mk III, 500mm f/4 + 1.4x II, 1/200, f/5.6, ISO 800
    Manual Fill Flash at -2

    Added canvas on left of vertical original and cropped to square.
    Removed a few sticks coming in from bottom.

    Photographed this week at Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge in Concord, MA.

    Looking forward to your comments and critiques!

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    Preety much the image I like the best of this sepecies, it has power, a stunning exposure, great atitude, lovely details, great BG, pose and perch as well. I don't like the square format but that is a very personal "thing" of mine heheh... it actually works good here. COngratulations!

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    Avian Moderator Randy Stout's Avatar
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    Mike:

    I agree with Ramon, great pose here. The head is really sharp, open beak, perch, BG all good.

    My only two comments would be:

    1)The reds on the epaulets look too hot, and in fact are blown in the red channel
    2)Wish for a little more DOF so more of the bird is sharp.

    Thanks for sharing.

    Randy

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    Avian Moderator Randy Stout's Avatar
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    Mike:

    I had a moment to work on the epaulets. I tried to tone down the red and render it more like the RWBB I have seen. Still quite vivid, but I think closer to the birds I have seen.

    Just an option for you.

    Randy

  5. #5
    Don Anderson
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    Mike, same great timing on the capture, good exposure, but the orig. reds are
    a little intense. f7.1 or f8 is the min. to get most of a bird in the DOF of any
    super tele. That said.. I really like the image.

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    BPN Viewer Dave Leroy's Avatar
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    Great timing Mike and excellent pose. Reds have already been noted and I prefer the repost. Dave

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    Anita Rakestraw
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    Great pose and I love the background, Mike! On my monitor, it looks a little too dark, I can't see much detail in the blacks....might be my monitor, as no one else has mentioned this. Makes me wonder if mine, newly posted, is too light???

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    Quote Originally Posted by Randy Stout View Post
    1)The reds on the epaulets look too hot, and in fact are blown in the red channel
    Randy is indeed correct regarding the posted jpeg.
    The Red channel maxes out at 231 in the Adobe RGB PSD file.
    Did a quick test and found that the red channel gets blown when the image is converted to sRGB.
    Anyone know of a way to avoid this or is it just a limitation of sRGB?

  9. #9
    Axel Hildebrandt
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mike Milicia View Post
    Randy is indeed correct regarding the posted jpeg.
    The Red channel maxes out at 231 in the Adobe RGB PSD file.
    Did a quick test and found that the red channel gets blown when the image is converted to sRGB.
    Anyone know of a way to avoid this or is it just a limitation of sRGB?
    I think it is simply a sRGB 8 bit issue. I noticed this problem with images made around sunrise, too. Even if the whites or reds are in the 230 area in the 16 bit TIFF file, they can still look clipped when saved as sRGB. A while back I posted one of those images as clipped sRGB and unclipped Adobe RGB. On most monitors the Adobe RGB looked better.

    The pose and BG looks great, the reds in the original look not quite 'natural' on my monitor.

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    Lifetime Member Marina Scarr's Avatar
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    Hi Mike:

    This RWBB is one of the best I've seen. I don't mind the OOF b/c the bird's head and chest are in focus. The reds are already mentioned. You can't beat this BG. The bird calling during the capture is an added bonus. Nice use of flash, too. Thanks for sharing.
    Marina Scarr
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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    This is killer good, the best that I have seen of this species by far. Anita, you need to get your monitor calibrated as the black are nice and black with great detail. I love everything about it even the square crop. The reds do look more natural in the repost--thanks Randy. You can try adding 30-70 points of CYAN to the REDs in Selective Color at various points in the workflow to yield more natural looking REDs.
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    Love the calling pose with the fanned tail. The opulets show great.

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    BPN Viewer Steve Canuel's Avatar
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    Great pose, nice detail in the shadows.

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    This one is outstanding as stated. First time I've seen a red-winged that has feathers that looks soft in a photo.

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    Ákos Lumnitzer
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    Man, this is really, really great! Love that attitude and you have stacks of black detail! Congratulations! :)

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    Anita Rakestraw
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    My apologies to you, Mike - I have now recalibrate my monitor and yes, you have great detail in your blacks!!! And mine is too light! So sorry! But glad to have discovered how badly I needed to recalibrate!!

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    Lifetime Member Stu Bowie's Avatar
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    Excellent detail and exposure on the blacks Mike. Lovely posture with the open beak, and pin sharp on the head. Im not too keen on the square crop, but not sure what else you could have done.

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    Thanks to all for the great feedback!

    I reworked the image from scratch starting with the RAW file and paid particular
    attention to trying to get the reds to look more "natural". I made several tweaks
    both in the RAW converter and in PS including Artie's suggestion of adding Cyan
    to the Reds with Selective Color. Any better?

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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    The REDs llok more natural to me in the repost. Still the best of this bird singing that I have ever seen. You gotta hate sun....
    BIRDS AS ART Blog: great info and lessons, lots of images with our legendary BAA educational Captions; we will not sell you junk. 30+ years of long lens experience/e-mail with gear questions.

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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    Just curious: about how many frames of this bird singing from this perch? Man, so sharp at 1/200th!
    BIRDS AS ART Blog: great info and lessons, lots of images with our legendary BAA educational Captions; we will not sell you junk. 30+ years of long lens experience/e-mail with gear questions.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Arthur Morris View Post
    Just curious: about how many frames of this bird singing from this perch? Man, so sharp at 1/200th!
    43 frames from this perch (not all sharp of course).
    He sang/displayed 7 times and I got a 5-7 frame burst each time.
    The posted image was at the peak of the last display which was the only one where he really
    put his heart into it, opening his wings, and fully displaying the epaulets.

    I try to catch the peak as it's usually the best pose and they seem to be fairly motionless
    at the peak of the display.

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    BPN Viewer Steve Canuel's Avatar
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    Hey Mike,
    I made a little tweak of the reds to match what looks closest to what I see out here in Colorado. Maybe MA RWBBs are a little different shade of red? Let me know what you think.

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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    Nice re-post by Steve. One t hing to realize is that if you optimize the same image on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday you are almost surely going to produce three slightly different looking images. Whatever the day or the tones, this one is great.

    Mike: I have been advocatiing one frame in anticipation of the perfect pose for years...

    See you next week. I am starting the long trip north from the Valley to Pelee tomorrow....
    BIRDS AS ART Blog: great info and lessons, lots of images with our legendary BAA educational Captions; we will not sell you junk. 30+ years of long lens experience/e-mail with gear questions.

    BIRDS AS ART Online Store: we will not sell you junk. 35 years of long lens experience. Please e-mail with gear questions.

    Check out the new SONY e-Guide and videos that I did with Patrick Sparkman here. Ten percent discount for BPN members,

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    Beautiful shot, i like everything about this from the pose, behavior, bg, feather detail etc. a real winner!

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