Ding Darling Spoonbills

[Garry Gibson]

I had almost given up on Ding Darling till the crowds left as it seemed like I
was part of the paparazzi in front of Britney Spears house if a Egret were close by.
God forbid a spoonbill or two were around.

One morning last week I had only a few minutes so I made a run through and
only one other guy and I were shooting. It was very early, around 7:30 am
so the light was coming from the east and these spoonbills were on the east side in a little
cove.

I like the dark background, I have several others from this shoot I like too.
7D
500 F4 with 1.4 TC
ISO800
1/160
f5.6

A bit of luminance noise reduction in Lightroom 3.2
Auto contrast in Photoshop and normal sharpening.

[Bill Dix]

Lovely preening poses, beautiful colors against the dark bg, and nice that you got an eye showing for both birds. I'm not convinced the image is stronger with the reflection than without it, but that's personal preference.

[David Stephens]

Congrats on having the place to yourself.

I love the vibrant color and great BG. I too wonder about the reflection. Since there's a bit of ripple in the water it's a little abstract, so I can think of it as "real" vs. "abstract" and it works. OTOH, a tighter crop on the actual birds would let me see more detail of them and draw me into them more, I think. If you want to leave the reflection, then I'd crop the top off to equal the space below the reflection.

Anyway, it's a terrific image. Thanks for sharing.

Dave

[Lance Peters]

Hi Garry - lovely pink hues - I am in two minds about the reflection also - usually not worth including unless it is strong.
multiple birds are a little more difficult to get good HA'S on both - a little separation between the two so their bodies did not merge would have been good.
Think the birds could stand a little more sharpening.
Done pretty well with the slow SS for the focal length.
lots to like :)

[wendell westfall]

I've never seen one of these in the wild, and envy you. Another vote to eliminate the reflection and to sharpen the birds a bit more . . .

[Bob Miller]

HI Garry....You have a real nice shot here. I would leave the reflections, sharpen the bird on the LS, and possibly add some canvas to the LHS. Congrats on a wonderful image!

[Dave Mills]

Hi Garry, Even lighting along with good detail. I also feel if a reflection is not sharp I might eliminate it. In this case they seem to be pulling my eye away from the birds. Agree with Lance's other comments...

[Garry Gibson]

thanks for all the helpful comments. I recropped and got rid of the
reflection and the resulting photo shows too much noise, noise that
is not evident in the crop I have show above.

I am going to try what Bob Miller suggested and add some canvas to
the left and try to sharpen the bird on the left and see if that adds
something.

Again, thanks for the help from everyone.

Garry

[David Thomasson]

I love the poses and composition of this image. Also the strong contrast between subjects and background.

I like the reflection even though the ripples blur it. What I don't like about it is the brightest reflections at the very bottom. They
attract my eye and divide my attention between the subjects and the reflection. So maybe a compromise that keeps the reflections
is to apply a gradient that darkens the image toward the bottom. Something like this ...

[Garry Gibson]

I made a couple of changes mentioned above, added some canvas to the left
and toned down the reflection. When I tried it without the reflection it just
didn't work, the image had too much noise.

Thanks very much for the kind and helpful criticism and ideas.