Went out yesterday to see if my buddy would be around waiting for me but no luck. This is from the same day as the last image. Here is when I first spotted him. He was in the shade of this tree and no sun was hitting him. I drove up under him with the sun roof open but couldn't get in a good angle, thankfully it was very windy and I was able to sneak out of the car when he looked away when the wind was in his face. He never seen me get into position.;)
I cloned out a branch that was hanging down to the right and lightened his eye a bit. Not sure of the BG green intersecting him? Let me know what you think. All C/C appreciated.
Brian
Canon EOS 50D
Aperture-Priority AE
Tv 1/400
Av 5.6
Evaluative Metering
Exposure Comp +1
ISO 800
Tamron 200-500mm
Focal Length 233mm
Good looking bird. I like the pose although I wish I could see some more of his feet.
I would gently clone back the area that is so close to his neck. The neck area there is soft, as if something was already done there?
I did a trial version where I did the cloning, added some canvas at top, and cropped in a bit from the right. To me it helped balance the image a bit more. It is very visually heavy on the left, and left lower corner, and by effectively moving the bird a bit to the right, thought it was a bit better.
The merge of the tree line with the body doesn't bother me too much, much better than than intersecting head or neck.
I did also try a very slight midtone adjustment, darker, to give more punch to the wings. Perhaps something to look at.
The conditions with the bright sky look challenging. I liked the psoe a lot. The focus seems to be on the perch instead of the bird's eye. A little warming will make it better IMO.
Brian I have few images of red-tails so I know how challenging it is to create a good image. You did well under tough conditions. The OOF treeline near teh head adn neck are teh most distrcting for me. Randy's cloning suggestion would certainly help.
Randy, thanks for the suggestions. Is this more of what you meant? Not sure the clone job is the greatest here. Add canvas top and removed from right and boosted contrast and color in the wing slightly. I just came back from another drive through "his" cemetery and didn't see a sign of him, although I did spot a Merlin but unfortunately he was perched on elec. cable and then flew off.
Lovely look back pose Brian, and I like how he follows the perch. I would maybe selectively sharpen the head a little more, and your repost looks good. Well done.
I had a version done earlier, and should have posted it, to better explain my thoughts.
I have cropped it, used your canvas expansion and cloning, warmed the color temp up a bit to compensate for the shade. (Agree with Kaustubh on this)
Some may think it is too centered now, but because our eye is so strongly drawn to the birds eye, I think it can still work. I like the way the body works the major diagonal of the frame. It is still too heavily weighted to the left, I don't see how I can fix that completely.
Red-tailed Hawk 2
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