I was roaming the beach at Sandy Point a few days ago. Only the most common shorebirds were to be found in the 90 minutes I was walking back and forth.
But as I was leaving I saw a buff-breasted sandpiper - a new bird for me.
The tide was high (or else it would not have been there) but that meant there was a lot of seaweed which made it impossible to get a shot with a good foreground and background, but I did the best I could.
I think you did well. The seaweed in the foreground looks almost like a basket, an interesting effect. I like the surf in the BG.
Well exposed, the foreground and body look a bit sharper to me than the eye, so perhaps another round of usm on the head/eye.
There is an subtle blue rim on the right side of birds body (left side in frame). I don't know if this is chromatic aberration or just from the feathers there.
Great find, it's been years that I have seen this species. The angle, light and BG look very nice. I would run NR on the BG and wish for a better head angle. There are several repetitive patterns in the foreground, I might work on this a little.
I like the habitat but I also notice the repeating pattern in the seaweed. A better head angle would really help this image IMO, and I would try to get the eye a little sharper.
Thanks for the comments. I did run nr on the background once - standard quto calibration using Noise Ninja. I will revisit.
Big problem for me is the seaweed. I worked on cloning but could not find enough in focus sections on the original to clone from. Any ideas would be appreciated. Below is what the seaweed looked like in the original.
One thought would be cropping a bit off the bottom.
Buff-breasted Sandpiper
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