Now that I have your attention (jk), I'm not sure about whether this image is more a snapshot memory of what I saw or an image that can be put on the wall. I like the head and wing position but can't decide if the OOF white bird kills the image. Taken on Genovesa/Tower Island in the Galapagos in April 2009. The brown booby was sitting on the branches of a tree and the white one came in and approached. I shot a bunch of frames but think this is the most dramatic.
Canon 50D
70-200 f4 non IS at 100mm
Tv 1/400
Av f5.0
ISO 800
No crop, selective lightening of the birds and darkening of the background. Noise reduction applied as well.
nice title, rachel.:eek: i think that a vertical crop would work well here. it would help minimize the somewhat busy left side of the frame and put more emphasis on the birds. i agree with the contrast boost suggestion. nice initimate interaction captured. i like it!
Thanks Dave and Harold - I added some more contrast. Btw I'm always nervous about too much contrast. Here's an attempt at a more vertical crop but because of the components it almost has to be square to work. Let me know what you think. Thanks,
Hi Rachel, Interesting behavioral image. The crop helped remove alot of the distracting backround but the left wing IMO doesn't look right cut so severely and is very bright. I would have also wished for more room around and a sharp bird in the foreground...
Hi Rachel A keeper would print to hang on your wall !!!
I like the suggestion by Harold to crop tighter, gets rid of the bg and focuses on the birds !!! That one bird looking at us is powerful and like the image a lot, not conscious of the other sharpness wise and like if for its position !!
On the tech side you could have dropped the shutter speed for dof but its easy to say after the fact !! If you were going for interactive images then you set up with the most dof possible and take a chance !! Excellent !!!
Oh Rachel!
Lovely intimacy. Birds I hope to see someday.
Hope you don't mind, I used the first image and played with some cloning on the left and then cropped. Just wanted to play with this image. :)
Hubby walked by and said "oh, how beautiful they are".
Thanks for the kind comments everyone. Ann -your repost is interesting and I thought about going all black but I struggle with the should I dramatically change the photo from what I saw issue. In this case though this is a somewhat artsy image for me so maybe going all the way to an art shot works. I'll probably play some more. Thanks your hubby too.
Once again, thanks to all for the help and encouragement.
Ok, here's the crop with more contrast, increased saturation and everything in the BG except the faint feathers cloned out. I also tried to decrease the hot spots. Much more "artsy" then anything else I've done. Please let me know what you think.
Hi Rachel, I prefer Ann's crop with more room on the left. The added contrast and saturation in your latest repost improve the image IMO. As Al mentions, the low f value gave you some oof issues, which don't bother me at all in the white bird, but I find the oof tip of the female's beak bothersome, as she is clearly the main subject. Overall, a very nice image!
Rachel, definitely a keeper IMHO. I like the brown bird being in sharp focus, and the great interaction more than offsets the fact of the other bird being oof. I also like the inclusion of the red foot. My initial reaction to your first repost was too tight a crop - the square crop works very nicely for me, but I would take out the grey area above the wing in the ULC. Nicely done.
Thanks Bill. I left the grey area above the wing because I'm pretty sure it is part of the wing. Those are the darker feathers on the lower portion of the wing. I had cloned it out at one point but prefer the symmetry of those feathers with the ones that are also on the other wing. Here's a bigger square crop to give more room on the right.
Hi Rachel, your latest crop looks great. I see why you left the grey area in ULC, but I agree with Bill that it's a bit distracting. Again, a fine image.
Mating Boobies
