This one's another "mystery" capture for me. It was part of a series I did a while back, and I felt that it was one of the weaker images in the series. However, the buyers have differed with me. It has enjoyed decent sales, and has certainly outsold the others in the series. Even the reviews have been really good on it. WHile I stopped trying to figure out my buyers a long time ago, I'm somewhat puzzled by the reviews (as compared to the rest of the series). It will be interesting to hear the comments from here, as I have a few nits with this one (which I will reserve for a later post) that others seem to miss (or not mind).
Canon 1DsMII, Canon 600mm f/4L, 1/250, f/5.6, ISO 200. Overcast, no flash
Hi Bob! Yes I also gave up on predicting what images client's prefer. Some of my favourite images get passed over in favour of ones that I consider just 'record shots'.
The image here appears a little bright on my monitor Bob and with birds having a black eye set in a black face I will often use a fill-flash to get that all important catch-light.
It is difficult to explain subjective feelings, Bob. Generally I like this. Nice light , pose , exposure control, lovely BG and pale perch complements well. If teh head turn were any more you would lose the typical shrike bill tip. For me the big distraction are the twigs in front of the bird extending up to beak height. If they were shorter it would be better but I would be tempted to prune them out completely. The right foot without part of the leg is a small niggle. As John mentioned a sharper catchlight would lift the image too. I would be interested to know what bothers you.
One excellent head angle makes up for a lot of twigs. Lovely BKGR does not hurt sales either...
Eye is a bit lost in the mask. Later and love, artie
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Great compo, Bob.
I would select the eye, if you can't use the masking technique. select it with the laso tool and feather by 2 pixels. Then do a curve. to lift the blacks and have the eye show.
I slightly cropped. Would have probably removed the loose branches in the left, but that was not my point now :)
Artie and Fabs both hit on my biggest nit with this....The eye lost in the mask. Great work on that Fabs!
The twigs don't bother me as much, but are a bit excessive I think. The one sticking through the tail actually bothers me more than the ones on the left do. I'd have liked a more pronounced (natural) catchlight too.
Loggerhead Shrike
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