Bonaparte's Gull Looking Up, Not At

[Paul Guris]

I like the head angle on this one because it's a bit different, but I'm interested in opinions on how it strikes other people. All other comments welcome as well. I know the wingtip is too tight to the bottom of the frame, but there no helping that until I learn to add wallpaper.



Nikon D90, Nikkor 80-400mm f/4.5-5.6
ISO 500, f/8, 1/1000, 0.33EV, 330mm (495mm equivalent)

[Doug Brown]

Hi Paul. The head and tail have good sharpness, but I might sharpen the near wing a little more. I kind of like the head angle, but I think it would be more effective if the bird hadn't already flown past you. I would add a little canvas at the bottom of the frame and trim a little off the top. One last thing. :) The image has a slight greenish cast, which is easily removed. Here's a repost with a color cast correction and some additional sharpening.

[Dave Leroy]

I really like the colour in the repost.

Bird must have been on the look out for another predator.

Good sharpness and nice spread on the tail.

Adding space is pretty easy to do and I think there is a tutorial in the tutorial section.

Dave

[Julie Kenward]

There is a tutorial in the educational forum so go check it out. It's really not hard to do once you get the technique down.

Doug's repost fixed the few issues I saw. You got a beautiful wingspan and a lovely exposure so pat yourself on the back for those! Also, when photographing birds over water try to keep an eye out for the waves intersecting with the head of the bird. It's always better to try to get them higher in the frame or lower so the bird isn't competing with the wave for the viewer's attention. (I know...easier said than done!)

[Paul Guris]

Thanks for the advice. I'm only editing in Aperture 3 today. Since most of the information available here is for PhotoShop, they give me the theory but not the exact practice. I found I could improve the color cast on the photo, but I still haven't been able to get it to the level of perfection that Doug nailed. I'll keep working on it.

Thanks again for the comments.

[Bill Stubbs]

....You got a beautiful wingspan and a lovely exposure so pat yourself on the back for those! Also, when photographing birds over water try to keep an eye out for the waves intersecting with the head of the bird. It's always better to try to get them higher in the frame or lower so the bird isn't competing with the wave for the viewer's attention. (I know...easier said than done!)

Julie,
That distracting wave when shooting over water sometimes happens in spite of our best efforts. I wonder if you (or any of our PS veterans) can comment on how best to deal with this in post?

Thanks,
Bill

[Mikko Viljamaa]

Julie probably has tons of better ways to deal with this but what I have learned lately is that selecting the BG (with the magic wand usually) and doing some heavy NR (even four times with #8) really blurs the BG and makes some slightly distracting elements to disappear. This all is really easy - not to mention that it also makes the bird "pop up" in the photo.


Mikko

[Bill Dix]

A lovely shot of this beautiful Bonaparte's -- wish I had one this nice. Doug's repost really helps the color cast. Certainly moving the bird up in the frame (adding canvas below, removing above) would help the overall presentation if you can do that in Aperture 3. As to the wavelet, I've also had some success using the Clone tool, to simply bring in some of the surrounding water over the dark wave, working on a bg layer at low opacity. More than one way to skin a cat.

[Julie Kenward]

Bill, as far as the waves go, about the only thing you can do is be aware of them and try using burst mode on your camera or else shoot off several at a time in hopes of getting one better than the others. Also, if there are options, getting up a bit higher so you're looking down on them more than being perpendicular can help. I'm sure some of the Avian mods can chime in with other thoughts as well.