Shot this image hand held . It was very difficult to focus the eyes of this bird as the head of the bird is so thin . The image quality is not so great but wanted some tips on shooting in these conditions form the experts .
Shutter speed 1/1600
Aperture F/5.6
ISO 400
Lens 100-400 L IS
Camera body 1D Mark II N
I'd try to select as many AF points as possible, maybe all 45? I don't have a pro body, so don't know how that would work Ram. You had plenty of SS for HH here. Not bad overall, but what is the strange blotch behind the head? Looks like a bad clone mark. :(
If the bird's head is on the same plane as the body, then you could try using a small aperture and focusing on the body. The DOF should ensure that the head is sharp. As presented, the heron looks pretty sharp to me. You did a good job getting it to stand out from all the clutter. The greens seems over-saturated though. Try de-saturating the green channel in hue/saturation some.
I am not sure what the problem is. The head, face, and neck of the heron are all razor sharp. Maybe you should be the one giving the tips here.... I would not recommend 45-point in this situation as there seems to be too much vegetation in the foreground and around the bird that the system might grab onto....
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Artie i have used some gaussian blur in the BG to make the eyes of the bird look sharp . But i was worried that i have selected the paddy field for the blur and the grass in the foreground is sharp this would make it look unnatural
It looks fine too me except that it looks as if the Gaussian Blur might have caught the single crest feather..... Best to compare it to the original to check.
BIRDS AS ART Blog: great info and lessons, lots of images with our legendary BAA educational Captions; we will not sell you junk. 30+ years of long lens experience/e-mail with gear questions.
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If you do your cloning on its own Layer and then add a mask you can paint what you need back in. Thank Denise Ippolito for that tip. She actually does it 2 ways, one as mentioned and another by using applying a change to the whole layer and then adding a BLACK mask and painting the effect in where you want it. Either way by using a Layer Mask you can paint stuff in or out as needed (by hitting control X).
BIRDS AS ART Blog: great info and lessons, lots of images with our legendary BAA educational Captions; we will not sell you junk. 30+ years of long lens experience/e-mail with gear questions.
BIRDS AS ART Online Store: we will not sell you junk. 35 years of long lens experience. Please e-mail with gear questions.
Check out the new SONY e-Guide and videos that I did with Patrick Sparkman here. Ten percent discount for BPN members,