Snowy Egret Fly-Over

[WIlliam Maroldo]

Sony A850~Sony 70-400G@400mm~ISO 1600~1/2000sec~F5.6~manual exposure~HH~overcast~1-3-2011~Houston,Texas~CS5

Just a simple example of the advantage of low contrast (soft) light. Comments and critique welcomed. regards~Bill

my website

[Tom Redd]

William, the wings are beautiful with the light coming through them. Good feather detail.

[Alan Lillich]

Very nice, one of the best white sky photos I've seen. Perfect pose and great detail, the wing translucency is superb. You've inspired me to look more at white skies, normally I don't like them - of course maybe it is my lack of skill.

[Julie Kenward]

William, this is a tremendously strong image low contrast image. I don't suppose we could talk you into showing the unprocessed file and talking a bit about what you did to get from point A to point B? I'm sure everyone would love to hear your thoughts on how you set your exposure, etc.

[Peter Farrell]

A really nice image, Bill. It has an 'angelic' feel to it. Nice low contrast shot with great details and a super flight pose. I like that the head is tilted just enough for good eye contact. I also would like to know what PP you did, if any, on this image.
Peter

[nancy hazen]

Bill, this is an amazing image. The light through the wings are perfect. The angle of the body and positioning in the frame are very pleasing. I second Jules' thought. I'd love to hear your processing steps. Excellent image.
Nancy

[WIlliam Maroldo]

Thanks for the kind words. I hate to be a disappointment on processing steps; not much to it. In ACR increased contrast a bit, decreased exposure , applied a small amount of luminance NR, and cropped from 24 to 13 MP. In this image there was no clipping and no recovery slider necessary.
In PS resized to 900 px width (web size), used smart sharpen (Amount 150% Radius .2px Remove: Gaussian Blur), then Save for Web. The most important aspects were the low contrast light (which makes exposure a piece of cake) and a high enough shutter-speed (1/2000sec).
About exposure; I shoot manually. Essentially I take a test shot with what I quess will work, examine the histogram and see if it is peaking to the right of center and if there is any clipping ("binkies"). Basically I want the histogram to be as far to the right as possible without excessive clipping, by first adjusting the ISO, then the shutter-speed, and then the aperture. The image will look overexposed on the camera LCD, but it will be "fixed" in post-processing.
regards~Bill

[Leon Robinson Jr.]

Beautiful image!

[Dave Leroy]

I really like the white on white look on this one. Perfect exposure and pose.

Lovely photo and very well done.

Dave

[WIlliam Maroldo]

As per Julie's request. Note: the Sony A850 has a 24MP sensor and is Full frame.

regards~Bill

[Dawn Currie]

The detail is spectacular. White birds are tremendously difficult and even more so against the sky. All I can say is WOW!

[Patrick Reames]

That is a terrific image Bill. You did a tremendous job controlling the light and contrast. Beautiful!

[Mike Wilhelm]

An outstanding image. Not much I can say regarding improvement. It is certainly one of the best egret shots I have seen and I have seen a bunch (and taken a bunch, too.) Congratulations!