Pacific golden plover, up close

[Craig Brelsford]

I shot the plover near Pudong Airport in Shanghai during the spring migration. For the close-up, I decided to do away with the messy background, opting for a natural-looking green. The result is less a recording of a historical event than a study of the plover. Simple portraits such as this one look especially good on small gadgets such as the iPhone.

Camera: Nikon D300
Lens: VR 600mm F/4G
Vibration reduction: on
Aperture: F/8
Shutter speed: 1/400s
ISO: 200
Exposure mode: aperture priority
Exposure compensation: -0.7EV
Flash: none

[Judy Lynn Malloch]

Beautiful portrait with excellent detail, eye contact and a very clean BG. Well done Craig.

[Mike Milicia]

Love seeing the detail on this beautiful bird!

This particular shade of green not so "natural-looking" to my eye.

[Arthur Morris]

Great job of getting close. Killer sharpness and detail in the plumage. The bill is muddy mess, and the BKGR is way over-saturated. Way. Thanks a ton for your membership support. Your extraction job is OK but will not win any Photoshop prizes.

Thanks a ton for your membership support.

[Craig Brelsford]

Arthur, hi, what does "extraction" mean here? Do you mean the way I created the new background around the bird?

[Juan Aragonés]

I totally agree with Artie about the background. I think that Artie is refering to the photoshop job that you have done to separate the background from the bird to apply a different processing and that, in this case, you went a bit far with the saturation producing a very unnatural result. The text in the image is a bit distracting too. Sharpness is fantastic :)

[Craig Brelsford]

I am considering your and Artie's points carefully, Juan. Thanks. I chose that green color out of thin air. From now on, I'm going to choose a more subdued background, using the dominant color in the original background when possible.

[Arthur Morris]

Good plan. Do make sure that your monitor is calibrated and that your color spaces are correct :)

[Arthur Morris]

Arthur, hi, what does "extraction" mean here? Do you mean the way I created the new background around the bird?

Hi Craig, I answered this the other day but it never loaded....

To work on the background, you either had to select the BKGR or select the bird and invert the selection.

Which did you do and how did you do it?

[Craig Brelsford]

Hi Arthur, I changed the background by choosing paintbrush in Photoshop. I then chose my color and started painting the background. BTW, I now understand what the extraction tool is. I didn't use it.

[Arthur Morris]

Craig, Are you saying that you did not use any selection tool and that you painted along the edge of the bird using a tiny brush? (I have never used the extraction tool--if there is one....--in Photoshop.)

[Craig Brelsford]

Hi Arthur, I painted the edge of the bird with the brush, sometimes changing just a few pixels at a time. Is there some other way of changing a background?