Killdeer

[Clyde Hopper]

As the shadow showes...The photo was created at noonish,with bright sun. so o darkened the bg,and added a small amount of blur.all adjustments to exposure done in ACR,and sharping done in PSE7.

Camera	Nikon D90
Exposure	0.002 sec (1/500)
Aperture	f/8.0
Focal Length	300 mm
ISO Speed	200
Exposure Bias	0 EV
Flash	No Flash
Image Description	Portrait of a Killdeer

as for my own critique,I think it too is a little dark,"AS most of my stuff is". I believe that is due to editing in a dark room,and PSE7 being on black bg.

any and all help welcomed!

[Sid Garige]

Clyde,

Very nice pose and head angle. You did pretty good job with toning down the background.
Little more space around the bird might help IMO. Just a little too tight for my taste.

[Gordon McKechnie]

Agree with all Sid's comments, would also add a suggestion to do a bit more selective sharpening on the eye & face. Where was the focus point - looks like it might have been on the body rather than on the face?

Good work with trying to deal with a challenging BG. Overall very nice capture

[Clyde Hopper]

Clyde,

Very nice pose and head angle. You did pretty good job with toning down the background.
Little more space around the bird might help IMO. Just a little too tight for my taste.

Thank You for your help,Sid. I will revisit this image and open-up the crop and see how it looks.
as a side note, I grew up in Opa-locka, good to meet a someone from S. Fla.

[Clyde Hopper]

Agree with all Sid's comments, would also add a suggestion to do a bit more selective sharpening on the eye & face. Where was the focus point - looks like it might have been on the body rather than on the face?

Good work with trying to deal with a challenging BG. Overall very nice capture

Thank You Too, Gordon. I always try to focus on the eyes,not always successful,...but will look tonight,after i get home,to see if i missed. but can and will,sharpen the eye & face
thanks again

[Dawn Currie]

When you relook at your cropping, I'd pay particular attention to the space below so that there is room for his feet that are hidden under the debris.

[Clyde Hopper]

When you relook at your cropping, I'd pay particular attention to the space below so that there is room for his feet that are hidden under the debris.

Yes, you are so right..thanks for pointing that out!

[Julie Kenward]

Hello Clyde! Lovely Kildeer here but way too dark! I brought him up with a levels adjustment and then did a separate curves adjustment on just his eye to help bring out the details there as well.

You have to be very careful with a BG like this one - dropping down to f5.6 or even f4 might have yielded the entire bird in focus with a much more blurred BG - just be careful to keep the bird's body adjacent to the sensor plane and you shouldn't have any trouble.

I recropped a bit but to get the eye near the ROT's position you definitely need more room top and bottom.

Keep them coming and don't forget to comment on the other images!

[Clyde Hopper]

Thank You Julie,