This image of a young Killdeer was taken at the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary in Irvine, California. I cropped the photo a bit tightly to remove some OOF grass at the bottom LC and RC. Also cloned out additional OOF grass at the bottom, as well as various distractions from the BG and a blob of mud from the tip of the bird's beak.
Taken with the 7D/400mm f/5.6, with fill-flash. Manual, f/8, 1/1600sec. RAW conversion via ACR 6.1 and PP in PSE.
Cute as a button. But too tight for me. EXP good--if a bit dark overall--but the head is unfortunately turned away. See the various head angle threads in the ER.
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Lots of detail here, and good exposure to my eye. Poor little fellow looks like he's had a rough day. Ditto Artie's comments about tightness in the frame, and of course HA. Still, nice image.
Beautiful lighting! nice and sharp, great detail. I like tight crops but if the OOF grass at the bottom is not too great a distraction I would prefer a little more room below.
Thanks for the feedback, everyone. I didn't realize there was a slight negative head turn until Arthur pointed it out. Now it seems obvious, so my eye for detail clearly still needs work. (That's why I joined this forum!)
As far as the crop is concerned, it's a bit tight even for my taste, but the OOF grass at the bottom was quite annoying and cloning it out was going to be tricky. The mud has quite some texture and detail, making the cloning too apparent. But maybe I just need to practice my cloning strategy (or need some hints from the experts).
The image doesn't look dark on my monitor (MacBook Pro), but then again, I have not calibrated it.
Cute shot. I like the feathers sticking out all over the place. I also like the lighting and the raised foot. The head angle and tight crop are not ideal, but they don't really detract much from the image, imo. The dark mud in the fg is the thing I find distracting.
Killdeer (Juvenile)
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