American Goldfinch

[Paul Kusmin]

I have quite a few shots of this species from the past few years but all are digiscoped.
What I wanted was to get one with the 500mm (which in my hands is now exactly one year old, how time flies).

Exposure: 1/1250
Aperture: f/5.6
Focal Length: 700 mm
ISO Speed: 250
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: No Flash

D300 + AFS-1 500mm f4 + 1.4x tele + tripod

C&C welcome, thanks for looking.

[Randy Stout]

Paul:

I like the overall composition a lot. Nice bird, HA, perch is interesting without being overpowering.
A couple points to consider. To me, the birds eye is not critically sharp. My guess would be that the point of focus was on the tip of the wings, at least that appears the sharpest to me

The yellows are a bit overexposed, esp. on the head, but sprinkled elsewhere as well. If you are using NX2 to convert, try pulling the highlight slider to the right a bit.

Thanks for sharing.

Randy

[Judd Patterson]

Hey, nice image Paul! I like this angle on the bird where we still have a nice hear turn, but we also get to see the full patterns in the wing and tail. I do wonder if you hit this with much noise reduction (doubt any is really needed at ISO 250)...only reason that I ask is the details along some of the edges (such as the goldfinch head with the background) seem a little soft. A little selective sharpening around the eye would also help this to pop! Great work with the 500.

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the angle, eye contact and perch. I agree with selectively sharpening the head and would remove the dark spot in the lower left.

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hi Paul,
Agree with advice given above. Really like the position and turn of the bird in this one.....nice perch too!

[Ramon M. Casares]

Randy preety much nailed the critiques IMO.Still nice image, I wouls suggest to crop some from the left to improve comp.
Congratulations.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Nice pose, and an interesting perch - if you are lucky you will photograph the same species when the fruits are ripe! The yellows Randy speaks of are not overexposed per say, but just a bit oversaturated - I brought your image in PS and desat the yellow channel by a mere 4 points and that took care of the clipping issue. I agree with Axel about the dark area in LLC.

[Juan Aragonés]

I echoe 100% Randy´s critics :-)

[Paul Kusmin]

Thanks everyone for the constructive criticism, much appreciated.
I tend to want to over-saturate for some reason, but I'm working on it.