Hi Folks:
52 Cedar Waxwings lit on the top branches (about 35') of the Arizona Ash in our garden on Monday. It was a very overcast day and to get the picture I used AP, set the speed to F/5.6, kept turning up the EV until I got blinkies (1.3) turned it back a notch, leaned back in my chair, and with the lens at 400mm I fired off a few shots. Wasn't too pleased with the tangle of branches, so I took the photo into CS4, cropped it, and thought this would be a good exercise and test of my eyes. So I viewed it at 300 to 500%, used the brush at varying sizes, hardness and opacity changing color constantly to match sky area I was covering and taking out the branches. Then I carefully cloned out the branches covering the birds. I then finished off a couple of bird areas with the brush set at 1 pixel to draw missing bits of outlines. When finished, it didn't look bad, however, viewing at 500% background was a bit blotchy in spots. So I took it into "Fotosketcher" (Free) and turned it into a oil painting with a frame. Frames included in FS.
CC's invited and always appreciated
Uncle Gus aka Windy :)
Olympus E-620, Zuiko 70-300 @ 400mm
Aperture Priority, F/5.6, 1/250s, ISO 100, 1.00 eV, Auto WB
Last edited by Gus Hallgren; 01-19-2010 at 12:24 PM.
Reason: Spelling
Hi Gus: I am very partial to multiple birds in one picture. These are beauties. I like your work at removing branches; however, the "oil painting look" does not improve the image for me.
Hi Gus I guess I'm more artistically oriented so I like the "oil painting" look, its all personal choice.
I like it for a couple of reasons, one it did clean the bg and second as a straight image the steep angle makes it tough !! ... your eyes are doing well !!!!
Cedar Waxwings Before and After
