Short-eared Owl

[Terry Olmsted]

Taken in dim light on the Skagit Flats Feb. 14, 2008.
Canon XTi 400 f5.6 1/800s f5.6 ISO 800

[Arthur Morris]

I like everything about this one, even the way your name balances the cropped COMP. The intense stare is wonderful.

later and love, artie

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the pose and composition but the bird looks quite noisy and I would raise the color temperature a bit.

[Grady Weed]

This is a great keeper. The natural camo is just fantastic. You could walk right by him and never know it. I bet the mice do just that...and he gets them. He looks well feed.

[Taylor Yeager]

The compostion looks good, but for me this image looks very photoshop'd. It looks like you took a large crop and then blurred in front of and behind the subject to make up for what your lens did not produce. In my mind this is not the way to create a striking image. I would rather see it presented before the blurring. It may have more distracting elements, but it would show habitat and to me, in this case, would be better for this particular image. However anyway you look at it you captured a special moment. Congrats.

Taylor

[Terry Olmsted]

Thanks for all the comments. Taylor, here is the orignal with no edits and approximately the same crop. The 400 has a very limited dof so basically the blurring was done by the lens. I have had so many comments on noise, that I also did blur the background and foreground a bit more to reduce same.
By the way, the ISO was actually 1600.

[Taylor Yeager]

I was reffering to the PS blur. The new image looks much more natural. I think it would look very nice as a black and white!

Taylor

[Terry Olmsted]

Thanks for the input, Taylor :)
Terry

[Robert D. Gregg]

Great job, Terry!!

BigBob...

[hal bruce]

Indeed a great job Terry.
You are to be congratulated on achieving such fine images under such difficult conditions.

PS. Lower color temperature is REDDER .eg 3200 Kelvin or Sunsets around 2800K. High color temp is blue/white. eg 7000K.
I'm amazed the PS has it the wrong way around and nobody has put them right.
As for grain (film) and noise (digital). It has been said (Delgado et al.) that grain and noise show that this is
a photograph. It's part of the process.
This wonderful image makes me want to see more of your work
eland

[Terry Olmsted]

Thaks very much for your comments Bob and eland. I appreciate the information and encouragement!
Terry