Resplendent Quetzal on the Nest

[Doug Brown]

In honor of my newly announced Costa Rica 2011 workshop, I'm posting my favorite image from the 2010 workshop. There was a pair of nesting Quetzals at our lodge no more than a couple of hundred feet from the dining room. They had the area roped off, but visitors could still get a good look at the comings and goings of the birds. For this image, due to the subject distance, I had to crop very significantly; fortunately the 7D is quite cropable. I also cloned out a vine on the left.



Canon 7D, 500mm + 1.4x, f/5.6, 1/50, ISO 400, fill flash, tripod

[Daniel Cadieux]

The green pops nicely against the tree. I like the comp. Neat to see the tiny claws gripping the hole's edge. I can see why this would be a favorite of yours.

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Doug, yes, IQ has held up pretty well. Loved the rule-of-thirds comp. a lot. As Daniel said, green against that tree is superb. And excellent flash work.

[Greg Basco]

Hey, Doug. I remember this one. Looks quite nice as presented here. I wonder what size print this crop would yield. Would be interesting to try.

Cheers,
Greg Basco

[Doug Brown]

FYI, when I said it was a significant crop I meant that this represents 10% of the pixels in the original image.

[Bill Holsten]

Doug,

You have saved the best for last. Good marketing technique. Amazingly crisp image for this much crop. You must have a sturdy tripod!

[Troy Lim]

Like the contrast against the tree.
TFS.

[Doug Brown]

Amazingly crisp image for this much crop.

This image brings me back to a discussion a while back in the General Photography forum. Some people delete images that don't occupy greater than 50% of full frame. I've always felt that if the image holds up well for its intended purpose, why not keep it. At 10% of full frame, I think this image looks pretty good for web presentation. As suggested by Greg Basco above, I may try to print it 13x19 to see how it looks. Just a little food for thought.

[Juan Aragonés]

Stuning details Doug. The crop seems to me a bit extreme, not for the printing possibilities (quality is really good and I am sure that with some bicubic resampling in PS you can get a superb print) but from a compositional point of view. The strong contrast between the bright colors of the quetzal and the colorless texture of the bark makes this image for me (and of course, that amazing eye contact). I think that this one could work very well in a vertical crop with the bird place in the right upper corner or a similar position but in landscape. I think that even you can go more far and broke some rules with this striking image and place the bird looking to the oposite direction that we all usually used to choose. Just some ideas :)

[Doug Brown]

Thanks for the thoughtful critique Juan! I like the versions on the left and top right. The other one is a little too OOTB for me! :o:)

[Glenda Simmons]

A very different image...colorful to say the least. My longest lens is a 100-400, so I often have large crops. I know the general rule of thumb is to try to fill the frame, but the end results is all that matters to me.

[Doug Brown]

I agree with you Glenda!