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Thread: Wood duck drake

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    Default Wood duck drake

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    I went after the wood ducks in the same lake (where I shot the previous one that I posted) yesterday. Got one in still water with overcast conditions. Went flat on the ground to get this angle.

    40d; 300 f/4L non-IS; 1.4x. roughly 75% crop. pulled half stop down in DPP. reduced highlights a bit to get the whites down. My flash batteries died on me. so no flash. Would it have helped? I have a 420ex and no better beamer.

    Exposure Time: 1/125.0 seconds
    FNumber: 8.0
    ISO Speed Ratings: ISO 640

    Let me know your opinions. Thanks a lot in advance.

    Kaustubh

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    Lifetime Member Doug Brown's Avatar
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    Hi Kaustubh. It's a Wood Duck profile on lovely green water. Regarding the flash, what was your distance to subject? You can post at 1024 pixels wide and 800 pixels high; it'd be easier to critique your images if you took advantage of the larger image size. I'd lighten the head a bit. Perhaps a little CCW rotation.
    Last edited by Doug Brown; 05-04-2009 at 04:33 PM.
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    Doug, is there a special way to save such that you dont lose details and yet it fits under 200KB? I am unable to fit it under 200kb with the pixel size that you mentioned. this is 195kb and the dimensions are 711 X 454. I resize and save using microsoft picture manager...just because it lets me resize in percentages which I prefer to photoshop's way.

    Thanks for your comments about lightening the head. I will go back in DPP and use the shadow slider to do that.

  4. #4
    Fabs Forns
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    The colors aver very attractive, I wouldn't have used flash here. You could have pulled the EXP and if you have Photoshop, do it in a layer and erase the effect on the darks. If not, as you mentioned, use the shadows slider to get more out of them. Agree on the rotation, very lovely and keep them coming.

    Big welcome to BPN!!

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    Hi, Kaustubh. In Photoshop, go under Image, Image size, then plug in 1024 for pixel width, at the top of the window, then OK. Then go to File, Save for Web and Devices, and adjust the JPEG quality % until you get the file size just under 200 kB.

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    Thanks Jory for pointing that out. Will do that from next time onwards

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    Super Moderator Daniel Cadieux's Avatar
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    Great low angle, and superb mood to this image. Flash may have helped, but without a better beamer the 420EX's flash output needs to be pushed some to make a real difference (I have the same flash/"problem"). The exposure looks pretty darn good. Levelling the horizon would be the cherry on top!

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    Default incorporated all your suggestions

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    Did the rotation. Tried to get some detail out of dark areas. Could not do much as noise was creeping through. Resized for web with larger size.

    thanks everyone

  9. #9
    Raul Quinones
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    I like it, nice low angle and colors. I will be tempted to run some noise reduction on the background (I use neat image, but any of those applications will do). Flash may have add an additional catch light, but the natural one is nice.

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    BPN Member Kerry Perkins's Avatar
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    Kaustubh, a couple of tips to save a lot of typing:

    In PS select "File - Automate - Fit Image". In the window that pops up set the width to 1024 and the height to 800. This will work for either horizontal and vertical images without having to do it each time, as these numbers will stay there unless you change them, so you can do this for each image that you are ready to post to BPN. To save even more time, make this an action and assign it to a key.

    When you are ready to save the image, select "Save for Web & Devices". In the save window, click on the little triangle (or optimize menu icon) that you see just below and to the right of the "save" button. In the menu that pops up click "Optimize to File Size" and set that value to 195K. I find that if you set this to 200K sometimes PS makes it a few bytes too big. (This value will also persist unless you change it.)

    Your file should now be all set to upload to BPN. Click "Save" and save your file.

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    Great shot but I like the repost of it even more. Great angle and detail. Well done

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