Canon 40D, 300mm f4L IS, f6.7, 1/500sec, ISO 320, evaluative metering, manual exposure,HH, shot through a window
Processed in Lightroom 2.6
white balance as shot: cloudy
Exposure adjustment: set black and white points
adjusted clarity and vibrance
brought highlights down on tone curve
applied sharpening, NR
tried to bring down brightness of white feathers between wings with adjustment brush
It was sunny, windy and cold outside. This bird gave me only about 5 minutes to get this image before it flew away.
comments appreciated
Last edited by Julie Brown; 01-30-2010 at 06:01 PM.
Hi Julie - Nice look-back pose and good detail. On my screen the adjustments you made to exposure in PP look pretty good, although there may be a bit of detail lost in the blacks. Nice image.
Would like seeing more room around the bird, good bg and pose. PS work is excellent .. btw for the whites you could use select by color and target the whites but you did well !!! Big Congrats on this one !!!
If this image were mine, I would brighten it a bit and increase the contrast (other than in the light color feathers). Details look good. Good eye contact as far as I'm concern. I think Artie would suggest more head turn till it's parallel to the film plan though :)
Thank you Bill and Al for your constructive comments. I have this image open in Lightroom now, so I will recrop and try to bring up the blacks a bit, and then repost. As for the bright white area and using the adjustment brush, I think I tried to do what you described, but I need a lot more practice.
I know that some people think that shooting wildlife through glass is a big no-no, but this bird just appeared while I was sitting at the computer and I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get this image from less than 10 feet away.
Last edited by Julie Brown; 01-30-2010 at 09:32 PM.
Thanks Desmond. I am going to try and improve this and then repost. I would have loved to get a better pose, but the bird did not hang around long enough. It kept turning its head, but not its body.
Here is the repost. I have a tendency to crop tight. I worked on the bright white area some more and used the clone tool to get rid of a hot spot in the BG. Hope this is better. :)
Last edited by Julie Brown; 01-30-2010 at 09:38 PM.
Hi Julie,
The repost is right on the money...I like the composition, image and capture. The color rendition and feather details are superb...looking forward to your next one...:):cool:
Northern Flicker
