American Avocet

[Christopher Ciccone]

Been a little while since I've posted anything, but I do swing by to see the advice that is given to others, and try to absorb it and incorporate into my work. I would say that if there are two things I have taken away from this forum, it is head angle and get low! (Comments made on previous posts of mine and often seen with others)

With that in mind, when I had this very cooperative American Avocet in my viewfinder this weekend, I tried to think of what the good folks at BPN would suggest.
This is probably one of the better photos I got.


I would be very happy to hear any comments, critiques, and suggestions that you could provide - there is always room to improve!

Cheers,
Christopher

[Jeff Cashdollar]

Chris, lots to like here. You nailed the HA and low profile is spot on. Please provide exposure techs, we can better understand the techniques used. The soft light is nice, maybe could be a tad lighter in the eye area; let's see what others say. Nice job with this one and the Avocet is a beautiful subject. Please visit more ofter and thanks for sharing.

[Christopher Ciccone]

Oops - had a feeling I was forgetting something!

Here are the specs...
Camera Body/Lens: 1dMkiii w/ Canon 500mm f/4
Focal Length: 500mm
Shutter Speed: 1/2500
Aperture: f/4
ISO: 200
EB: +2/3
Metering: Matrix

The original RAW was a little hot (exposed too far to the right), so I brought it back down a bit in ACR, cropped about 50% to bring it in tighter, and sharpened in CS3.

I only wish I had made it to the location earlier (this was shat a little before 10am) to get a little more even light, and maybe eliminate the body shadow cast on the far leg.

[Mike Milicia]

Hi Christopher,

Great bird for New England and nice setting and walking pose ... open bill is a nice touch!

You did well for the sun being a bit high. This is the kind of situation where you might start considering the use of fill flash to lighten the shadow along the bottom of the bird and make it a bit less harsh.

Since you indicated this is a large crop, I would add some more room at the bottom for the virtual feet if you have it.
If you imagine that the bird's right foot was visible (actually you can make it out a bit under the water), you can see that it's quite close to the bottom of the frame.
I wouldn't mind seeing a bit more room on the right as well.

Whenever you have enough light, it's usually a good idea to shut down at least one stop from wide open as the lens will be a bit sharper.
In this case, given your camera body, you could have shut down to f/5.6 and raised the ISO to 400 and still had your 1/2500 shutter speed with no significant noise issues.

Just another note regarding exposure. It looks like you had bright sun on a clear day and given the time you captured the image (about 4 hours after sunrise), you had Sunny f/16 conditions.
Sunny f/16 exposure for ISO 200 and f/4 is 1/3200, which is 1/3 stop below what you shot at and it sounds like that would have been exactly what you wanted in this situation.
So you could have just locked in any Sunny f/16 equivalent exposure in manual mode and had a perfect exposure on every shot with the Avocet in direct sunlight.
This would have also allowed you to make a conscious decision in advance about the tradeoff between SS, aperture, and ISO.

[Jeff Cashdollar]

Chris,

Thanks for the techs. I know what you mean regarding earlier; often around 10:00ish seems the light get harsh on a clear day. Looks like you are shooting in AV mode. Might have bumped the ISO higher (I almost always shoot at 400). A reduced 5.6 would have both narrowed the aperture, helped DoF and brought the lens closer to the sweet spot. I tend to use 400 on my Canon equipment but 200 is alright, but limiting IMO as mentioned above. You can also bracket your images. As I learned on Chickadees many years ago, expose for the highlights and things tend to fall in place.

Nice comments by Mike on exposure too.

[Christopher Ciccone]

Thanks guys for the comments & suggestions, and especially for the comments on exposure.
(I do usually shoot with ISO set at a min of 400 only going higher when I need to, and very rarely going lower - was actually a bit surprised by the 200 setting - just goes to show that you need to double-check your settings before starting out!)

[Mike Milicia]

(I do usually shoot with ISO set at a min of 400 only going higher when I need to, and very rarely going lower - was actually a bit surprised by the 200 setting - just goes to show that you need to double-check your settings before starting out!)

Yes, been there, done that!

That's another of the many advantages of shooting in Manual whenever feasible. You get fewer "surprises" since you have to make a conscious decision on each setting.

[Jeff Cashdollar]

Good thread, looking forward to more from you Chris.

[Christopher Ciccone]

Finally had a few moments to try re-cropping as Mike suggested. Better?


Cheers,
Christopher

[Kerry Perkins]

Hi Christopher, very nice capture and presentation and the repost looks much nicer with the added room on the bottom. Excellent critique by Mike, thank you! Saved me a lot of typing! I look forward to more from you Christopher, very nicely done.