7D BI #1

[Jay Gould]

After spending 3 wonderful days in the Jim Neiger HH flight school using the the wonderful but slow 5D2 I received my 7D in time for the James Shadle tripod, sit in the water, get that image school. I had a most enjoyable time.

The fact that my computer died a thousand deaths from the BSOD, James asssted me in purchasing a new computer the 2nd day during a school break, and finally just yesterday I was able to load LR and other processing programs added to the adventure.

At this moment I am at LAX awaiting my flight to Australia so that can spend one night before Jackie and I depart for South America.

I had to post at least one image before departure - identification please!

Camera: 7D
Capture date/time: 2 Oct 09; 10:26am
Light condition: sunny
Lens: 300 f/2.8
Focal length: 480mm
Extender: none
Tube: none
Flash/Comp: no; none
ISO: Auto - 400
Exp Prog: M
Speed: 1/1000 sec
Aperture: f/7.1
Exp Comp: none
Metering: Evaluative
WB: Auto
AF Drive: AI Servo
Tripod: no
All C&Cs gratefully appreciated!

[Desmond Chan]

Wow, finally Jay ! Looks like they taught you well ! The bird looks good. On my monitor it looks like it could use some sharpening though especially the eye. Your call. Also, noise seem to be showing up in the sky, hopefully it's just my eyes fooling me ;-) Also something looks like a dust bunny in the lower half near the bottom of the photo ;-) Composition-wise I personally would not need to see so much room on the right but would add some behind the bird. And if you choose to crop like that, then you also have to adjust the top and bottom of the image accordingly.

Good job nonetheless !

Looking forward to seeing more from you !!

[arash_hazeghi]

Congrats Jay on your fits flight shot, open beak is the main feature here. I would crop tighter as you have too much empty sky and also run noise reduction on the sky, you want the uniform areas of your image to be as smooth and noise free as possible.

Congrats and best of luck, we look forward to your next one.

[Gus Cobos]

Hi Jay,
Congrats on the capture...I agree with the good advise given, I also might add that perhaps you can open up the mid-tones in the under wings to bring out the details, and you can experiment on making this into a pano crop to follow the direct of flight taken by your subject...looking forward to your next one...:cool:

[Jay Gould]

Hi and thanks for the comments. Lets start with dust bunny removal and a pano look; I have also attempted to apply levels and curves to the image.

I still need to load noise reduction and sharpening programs; thoughts on ease of use - I have access to the following: Topaz DeNoise, Nik Define and Sharpener, PixelGenius Sharpener, Noise Ninja.

[Harold Davis]

i like the repost. better underwing detail and the crop makes sense! i might still run a little NR on the BG. looks to be some very fine noise there. hope you had a great time in FL. couple of stellar trips you took!!!

[Desmond Chan]

One thing I don't understand. Yours is a new 7D, and you were shooting with ISO400. Why does the sky appear to have a visible hint of noise there? IMO, you should not need to run any noise reduction on the sky.

Or are they artifacts due to post-processing?