Kestrel with issues

[Meesh Fink]

Kestrel on his evening perch with a Collared Lizard, 7D + 400mm, ISO 640, f/8, 1/1600, gimbal and tripod. I was setup to try to catch him fly in, it would have been very helpful to have lowered ISO and shutter speed for the perched photos.

This is a major crop that I'm trying to save. ISO was 640 and there's a fair bit of noise that Noise Ninja didn't seem to assassinate. After some experimenting, I ended up lowering overall contrast to remove artefacts from the sky, then painted contrast and sharpness on to the bird and perch with the brush.

I do see a little sharpening halo on the bird, overall it looks too sharpened. What else can/should be done with a big crop like this to make it look better?

I don't care so much about this photo and would be tempted to bin it, except that my friend studies Collared Lizards and this is of interest to him.

[Don Hamilton Jr.]

cool, and different. I think you did a great job considering, the angle is tough as well. Poor lizard...
Don

[Joe Brown]

Nice shot. Shots of raptors with prey are special and from my experience Kestrels are difficult subjects to get near.
I find the strong contrast and bright highlights harsh. Did you try selecting the sky and applying NR to just the sky? I suspect the WB may be a little off as the bird has a yellow tone, they should be more reddish brown and the sky is deep blue. Here's my attempt

[Meesh Fink]

cool, and different. I think you did a great job considering, the angle is tough as well. Poor lizard...
Don

Thanks Don. Yeah, these guys are hard on the lizards. :(

[Meesh Fink]

Joe, I like your revision a lot! Thanks!!

I did try making a layer and adjusting the sky separately, but for some reason Noise Ninja wasn't behaving well & it still looked pixelated.

Nice shot. Shots of raptors with prey are special and from my experience Kestrels are difficult subjects to get near.
I find the strong contrast and bright highlights harsh. Did you try selecting the sky and applying NR to just the sky? I suspect the WB may be a little off as the bird has a yellow tone, they should be more reddish brown and the sky is deep blue. Here's my attempt

[Joe Brown]

Meesh I use Neat Image and I find that it isn't always effective in removing noise in the sky.

Joe

[Dave Mills]

Hi,I like the pose and the lizard adds greatly to the image. The biggest issue is the harsh light which at times can be difficult to correct convincingly. I could see how Joe tried to tone down the lizard but very often it becomes gray. In this case the angle doesn't bother me that much.
I see the halo your talking about around the tail. I can also see a darker shade of blue around the branch on the lower right.
Your dealing with 2 issues to overcome...harsh light and a big crop. Very often it pays to wait for the best light..

[arash_hazeghi]

nice, love the prey, the image is way over-sharpened and shows heavy artifacts, highlights are also blown. It might be an artifact of too much noise reduction, I would go back and redo the processing.

[Meesh Fink]

Hi,I like the pose and the lizard adds greatly to the image. The biggest issue is the harsh light which at times can be difficult to correct convincingly. I could see how Joe tried to tone down the lizard but very often it becomes gray. In this case the angle doesn't bother me that much.
I see the halo your talking about around the tail. I can also see a darker shade of blue around the branch on the lower right.
Your dealing with 2 issues to overcome...harsh light and a big crop. Very often it pays to wait for the best light..

Thanks Joe. The question this leads to is - when is the best light? The kestrel comes in around 6pm, so it's evening.

I'm in the Rocky Mountains at about 7,000' altitude. I've heard several comments from people that come to my area to shoot (near Mesa Verde) that the light is very intense and harsh.

[Meesh Fink]

nice, love the prey, the image is way over-sharpened and shows heavy artifacts, highlights are also blown. It might be an artifact of too much noise reduction, I would go back and redo the processing.

Thanks for the comments. Here's a retry. I got my layers and Noise Ninja to work better... I used less contrast and sharpening. Leaned it back toward blue a titch. Highlights are recovered.

Let me know if this is better.

[Harold Davis]

meesh, your repost is a ton better!! every last thing looks better. as said above, you had some tough conditions to work with. what is that thing hanging from the perch? if it's not of importance i would remove it.

[Meesh Fink]

meesh, your repost is a ton better!! every last thing looks better. as said above, you had some tough conditions to work with. what is that thing hanging from the perch? if it's not of importance i would remove it.

Thanks Harold - that is the lizard's tail! Gotta keep that!! ;)

[Harold Davis]

sorry, meesh!!! i wasnt even reading. at first look i thought it was a frog!!!!:o:o:)

[Lance Peters]

Hi Meesh -repost does look better - The harsh light is the issue here though. Softer light would have made a huge difference - pity these guys dont co-operate.
The lizard really needs to have detail.
Not much you could have done given the circumstances.
Keep em coming :)

[Alfred Forns]

Great advice Meesh Main points are harsh light and steep angle All working against you .. wold desaturate the blue on the last re post !!!