Photographed this Spotted Sandpiper about a month ago at Natural Bridges State Beach in Santa Cruz, CA. This is the same individual as in http://www.birdphotographers.net/for...per&highlight= and, yes, it was attracted by playing a song.
Disclosure: the background was kind of busy and distracting in the original. Unfortunately, I wasn't successful evening it out and making it more pleasant by local adjustments. So, I generated a copy of the background layer excluding the bird, used blur/average to smoothen things out and then adjusted the opacity of that layer to taste. Finally, I painted in the foreground again. You're of course the judge but I am pleasantly surprised how well it worked. :)
Nice low shot and the colors are pleasing -- the white splotches around the birds tail and underneath are distracting as I my eye is drawn to that brightness and not the bird -- it might be my monitor but I would like to see more detail in the whites on the bird
I agree with Scott on the white blotches but otherwise it looks very good. As you know, I loved the original post too. I am not sure but I would like to think that if I saw this without comment that I would think that it looked a bit cut out.... But I am not sure.
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Good technique and successful for the most part, but I think Artie is right about the cut-out part - specifically around the back of the head. The rest looks pretty darn good. (I am OK with this type of work with disclosure, so thanks for letting us know what was done):)
I love the feet, one curved with the rock and the other raised, very neat. I'd make the pupil of the eye a truer black. Overall well done!
Thank you all for the kind feedback. Given that Scott and Arthur find the white patches in the background still distracting I am very glad that I didn't post the original... ;)
As for the cut out look, I presume that it is related to the introduction of the average/blur layer as I didn't do anything differently otherwise and it is the first time I got such comment. How would you avoid that?
Spotted Sandpiper
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