Yellow-crowned Night Heron

[WIlliam Maroldo]

Sony A700~Sony70-400G@300mm~F6.3~ISO500~ 5-17-09~Brazos Bend State Park, Texas~overcast
CS4 /Topaz Adjust (fine detail preset)/ Topaz Clean 2
The Night Heron attacking a crawfish in duck weed. Incidentally he got it.
Comments and critique welcomed~Bill

[denise ippolito]

William, I really like the sketch-like look to this. You added the perfect amount of Topaz filters to this also. I'm not sure but it looks like it has a slight color-cast to it. It may just be the BG and the duckweed. Nicely presented!

[WIlliam Maroldo]

denise: I'm glad you liked it. I'm sure there is a color cast, and I keep forgetting to adjust it. The problem is that when there is a bunch of duckweed around every bird has a greenish cast. You should see what it does to great and snowy egrets! regards~Bill

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

THis looks great William. I must check out this Topaz stuff sometime soon.

[Fabs Forns]

Very nice as presented, Bill, you have been getting great stuff lately, thanks for sharing it.
It may have a slight green cast, maybe by your choice?

[Jackie Schuknecht]

This is great William, it almosts looks like a lithograph out of a book. Neat action pose too. I love what Topaz can do!

[WIlliam Maroldo]

Thanks guys! Fabs: no, I wasn't trying for a green cast, I'm sure I could do something about it.
About the plugins:
Before you jump to the conclusion that if you use them you'll get similar results, I need to point out that the quality of the original photograph is much more important than the plugins . The original image must have sharp edges and considerable detail. Detail that isn't there can not be enhanced. Edges that are not sharp become thick blurry lines. I must also say that I don't use the plugins to full effect, and always throttle em down with "fade last command". regards~Bill

[Dave Phillips]

Nicely processed Bill.....Here it is with color cast removed for a comparison.
IMO, a bit of the corcast could definitely be left in for a nice effect.
Also note that you are still posting in Adobe RGB......converted to sRGB
is best for all web browsers to interpret colorspace correctly.

[Dave Mills]

Hey Dave, Like what you did with the repost removing the caste.. IMO Makes the image more interesting. Nice effect Bill.

[denise ippolito]

Dave P.-Thankyou for taking the time to do a re-post. I like them both!!