Waning late afternoon light on a clear cold late Dec. day. I've been after these guys all winter with little success. They are masters at never letting the photographer get between them and the sun. But shots and heads down feeding is their specialty. Nikon D200, Nikkor 200-400mm, TC 1.4, focal length 550mm, matrix, f/7.1, 1/320, ev +1.33, iso 400, bean bag on truck window. Removed background weeds, 30% crop, minor levels, curves and hue/sat, selective noise red. of bg and sharpening of subject. C&C appreciated.
This is a lovely image Gary. What a great bird. We had them here years ago but hard winters finally were too much for them. I like the pose and head angle. Great eye contact. Exposure looks just right. You mentioned how hard it is to get them between you and the sun so I won't mention the uneven lighting from the right! Despite this you have some nice detail in the shadow on the back of the bird. I would suggest a bit more room below and run another round of sharpening.
I agree with John: a lovely image. I really like how the warm colours of the bird stand out against all that cold snow. Also love the pose and the little tilt of the head. Really nice, Gary.
love the feather detail and the hilarious roundness - what a great bird! You got really lovely color and detail with difficult light - might like to see another round of sharpening on the head - wonderful image.
Good repost Gary. At BPN we encourage full reportage on modifications like adding canvas but at the same time it's good to disguise what you have done as much as possible. In this case I would have used the clone tool to remove the duplication of snow pattern. Also a nice trick is to take the blur tool and run it over the area at the bottom to simulate depth of field.
Ethically speaking, I have no problem making mods like this. Why not improve an image if in the end it might be hung on your wall for example. I am in favour of reporting such edits where appropriate.
What a beautiful bird, Gary. I immediately thought of The Partridge Family.
John covered everything I was going to say except for one thing - you might try pulling back the blue tint to the snow a bit. If you like it as a mood enhancer than certainly leave it as is, but if not, open a hue/adjustment layer, select blues, and then desaturate them by sliding that saturation slider to the left.
I think the image was very good to begin with. Exposure, sharpness and color all seem very good. I did think there was a little too much room on the top which did make the original feel a bit unbalanced, but that was fixed in the repost.
Nice job overall!
Gray Partridge
