Tricolor from "The Farm"
I took this photo last month during breeding/nesting season. Canon EOS 50D; Av mode; f4.0; Shutter speed 1/800; ISO 1000 (auto); Canon 500mm f4 lens on tripod; some increase in vibrance and hue/saturation; topaz noise reduction some sharpening and brightening on the eye; removal of one small bright area in the background; Gausian blur on the background; and a NIK software vignette blur filter.
C and C welcomed.
Jim
Hi Mike,
Like your image. Colors are very pleasing to my eye. Wish the vertical, white bar going from below the breast up to the bill, and the one out in front of the bill weren't there!
Cheers,
Bruce
HI James - love the colours on the bill.
Looks to have a Halo around a lot of the bird. Over-sharpening or a result of your background blur - either way quite noticeable.
The whites on the head feathers are close to being over around the 253+ mark - might recover some of these with a multiply layer - best to try and get it right in camera though thru the use of your histogram.
Like the pose hard to tell were your point of focus was??? Eye could still use some sharpening.
Keep them coming :)
Hi James,
this is a sweet capture...Mr. Peters nailed the techs. I would have liked to have seen a better head angle and eye contact on your subject...looking forward to your next one...:cool:
I did not use any feathering. Would that help reduce the halo?
Jim
No, Gaussian blur is the culprit. If you use a selection (or mask) when blurring a background, G/blur will leave halos; Lens Blur will not. It has a "layer mask" option in the dialog box.Originally Posted by James Boland
In this case, masking or selecting would be very difficult because of the fine feathers that are almost impossible to select cleanly. You'll find more discussion of the G/blur problem in this thread on another forum. This link describes a way to use G/blur on a background and avoid halos.
Thanks David.
Hi James! I do have a few observations. In the first place colors are oversaturated. I think major problems originated with the ISO 1000, and since you apparently used a tripod, it is not only unneccesary, but has big disadvantages, especially if the image was underexposed in the first place. If you had ISO set on auto, if that is what I am reading in your data, I would eliminate the practice, and choose an appropriate ISO yourself.
The halo looks like the result of shadow/highlight filter use, and an attempt to fix an underexposed image. Increasing the brighness globally blew out the whites. I realize, as you explained, you applied a blur to the background, and felt this was the cause, but it looks precisely like shadow/highlight artifacts. Noise reduction will only reduce detail, and although it can have acceptable results, I'm afraid this isn't the case here. Underexpose and high ISO are a recipe for disaster.
The feather detail is not good, and sharpening the eye is not IMO going to help much. I think a basic focusing error is to blame, and the eye should have been in sharp focus originally. Even if that had been done correctly, a more appropriate depth of field should have been considered, and at least the entire bird could have been in focus.
The basic problem began due to two fundemental errors. The bird is backlit, and thus needs positive exposure compenstion. Failure to do this resulted in underexposed image. ISO choice was inappropriate, and this as well as underexposure resulted in unacceptable noise. Focusing and depth of field were insufficient.
Solutions: Avoid backlit subjects until you have a good idea of how to deal with them, which might require understanding of exposure compensation or the use of a fill flash. Pick appropriate ISO, and understand why you need to increase or decrease it. Do you need a higher shutter speed, or aperture, that lower ISO's are not permitting to get a good exposure or image sharpness?
About blurring the background post processing. Not as easy as you might suppose, and I see ithas was mentioned by David. Also, as mentioned, selection of a mask is often required when the subject is complicated, as are parts of your image. Less complicated images can dispense with selection masks and Guassein blur can be used. I think it is better than other blur types. You need two duplicate layers from your image. Blur is applied to the bottom layer and after preparing the bottom layer as I will explain, the backgound erased on the top layer. However, it is necessary to use a clone tool to eliminate a large part of any subject edges on the bottom layer, or halos will result. I just go ahead and remove the subject completely, with the clone stamp tool, and you don't really have to be exact. The gaussein blur will remove any imperfections, and the "bleeding" of the subject colors, which causes the halos, will not be a problem when you erase the background from the top layer. Hope I've been helpful~Bill
Last edited by WIlliam Maroldo; 06-04-2009 at 09:56 PM.
hi james, lance offered a great critique and david gave some great advice!! i think this one is well worth trying again. i like where you were going. would love to see a repost with the recommendations.
Thanks for all of your comments. I will reprocess the image and try to incorporate the suggestions. One of the reasons I was working on blurring the background was to eliminate distraction elements that appear on the base image. Perhaps I was somewhat over zealous in my efforts. I will re-post when I finish. Thanks again.
Jim
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