Resplendent Quetzal Portrait

[gary rouleau]

Costa Rica

Canon 1DmarkIII
Canon 600mm f/4

iso 1250 f/8 1/400

Comments/suggestions?

Cheers
gary

[cynthia walpole]

I absolutely love the soft light on the quetzal's bright coloring. I think you captured him at the right moment. The background looks to me like it could use some toning down, by blurring and/or darkening the brights.
Do you have his tail?

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the look-back pose, sharpness and perch. The eye looks a bit overflashed and having the tail in the frame would have made it even stronger.

[susanschermer]

Hey Gary! If you photographed this beauty where I think you did, it was impossible to shoot from further away to encompass the tail. What I did in a similar situation was take two images, the top half and the bottom half, and composed a vertical pano. Still I find the detail in the feathers lovely, and being so close allowed you to get rid of some of the highlights in the BG.

[Juan Carlos Vindas]

Wonderful image. Love the iridescence of this Quetzal. As mentioned above, the steel eye don't work in here but that is not so difficult to fix. Just my two cents.