Northern Flicker

[Peter Farrell]

He isn’t sleeping. He just closed his eye before sticking his head in his nest hole to clean it out.
Sony A700, 70-400G @400mm, f7.1, 1/800, iso1000, ev +0.3
PP in PSE8, I totally re-did the BG from what was there by cloning and blending the few good spots and then blurring it. Levels, s/h, color boost, usm on bird.
Is the closed eye okay??

[Alfred Forns]

Hi Peter Good looking bird, pose and bg Just over sharpened ... if you did on a layer just back down the opacity !!!

[Lance Peters]

Hi Peter - agree with AL - looks over sharpened on my screen also.
Bg looks good - hope to see a repost.

[Bob Decker]

The eye probably shouldn't matter but honestly, it does bother me a tad.

[Peter Farrell]

Thanks Alfred, Lance and Bob for your comments.
I thought I got past the oversharpened stage!:o
Peter

[WIlliam Maroldo]

Hi Peter. I don't think the main image problem is oversharpening. Of course I could be incorrect, but I think the image was underexposed, lightened up post-processing,then sharpened(unsharp mask gives you apparent sharpness at the cost of noise). If you have noise in the first place, USM will make it worse.
Even if the image was exposed correctly, right in the middle of your histogram, at ISO 1000, you have a problem. You need to expose to the right.
Unsharp mask, etc., is generally used after you downsize the image, before you convert to JPEG for the web. This is because you lose detail by making the image smaller, and USM, actually a visual trick done by increasing edge contrast, compensates for this. If your full size image is not reasonably sharp, USM will not give you more detail.
regards~Bill