Bar-headed Geese

[Richard Stern]

Taken from a small boat on the Chambal River, near Agra in Feb. It's not the usual single bird with a plain background image, but I like it as an overall pleasing image of birds in their habitat. I wonder if it's a bit contrasty for some tastes.

Camera Model: NIKON D300 , 80-400VR, hand-held
Focal Length: 200.0mm (35mm equivalent: 300mm)
Focus Distance: Infinite
Aperture: f/8.0
Exposure Time: 0.0008 s (1/1250)
ISO equiv: 800
Exposure Bias: +0.33 EV
Metering Mode: Spot (It probably should have been matrix but I forgot to re-set it).
Exposure: aperture priority (semi-auto)
White Balance: Manual

Comments welcome

Richard

[Lance Peters]

Hi Richard - like were you were heading - The merging birds are not ideal - sort of doesn't give your eye's a point to lock onto, as presented I think I would crop the top bird (And a slice from the bottom) out completely turning it more into a pano and maybe add a little room up front for them to fly into.
Some of the whites do seem to be lacking in detail.
Keep em coming :0

[Tom Graham]

Other than number of geese, position, composition, etc, I see an overall gray haze to the image. As for "details in whites" I don't see any whites, the wings are about a 190 gray as measured in Photoshop. Needs -more- contrast, not less.
Tom

[Alfred Forns]

Great comments !! Excellent pointing out the lack of contrast!!

With multiple birds just watch for good positions and some times will get one, not easy !!!

[Lance Peters]

Other than number of geese, position, composition, etc, I see an overall gray haze to the image. As for "details in whites" I don't see any whites, the wings are about a 190 gray as measured in Photoshop. Needs -more- contrast, not less.
Tom

agree Tom --- hmm will have to adjust the brightness on my iPad screen I think
not sure if how I can Colour manage this thing lol

[Bob Decker]

It almost looks more like a drawing than a photo. I suspect thats do to the haziness/lack of contrast and or a lack of detail in the white/gray feathers. Agree that the need so RH canvas to give them someplace to move into. If there were more space above the top bird, and a little less water below the flock, the top bird would become the focus of the image. That might work for me as well as cropping out that bird to bring focus onto the flock.

[Richard Stern]

Thanks for the comments. I had actually saved several versions of this image, cropped in different ways. Here's a version that I hope incorporates some of your suggestions.

Richard