what do you think?

[Michael Barbuschak]

Canon EOS-1D Mark III
F-stop - f/7.1
shutter - 1/800
ISO - 1000

[Josh O'Donnell]

I think you did a very nice job exposing this image, there is lots of detail in the whites which can be hard to accomplish. If this were my image I would get rid of the white spot in the upper left corner, it's very distracting.

[Judy Lynn Malloch]

Hi Mike. A nice portrait of the great white egret and you handled the exposure well but I find it looks a tad soft on my monitor and I agree about cloning out the white spot in the upper left corner.

[Robert Amoruso]

Hi Mike, thank for posting.

I like the placement of the bird in the image with the body in the lower right and the s shape of the neck leading the viewer into the image. I would have preferred the bird's head just a bit away from you as that would have put the beak in line with the eye and in focus - though that is a minor nit as you do have him turned towards you as that is what you want.

I would wish for a bit more room at the top. Cloning out the white spot would be good. It looks a bit soft so maybe a bit more sharpening though it does appear that critical focus on the eye was not attained. My suggestion would be do a selection only of the eye and sharpen that itself and then sharp only the bird.

Again, the positioning of the bird is strong compositionally. Nice work.

[Arthur Morris]

Hi Mike, The image looks pretty sharp to me and the exposure is perfect. As a general rule, it is best to work against evenly toned backgrounds with images like this. Unusually light and unusually dark areas tend to draw the viewer's eye away from the subject. In addition, you needed to have more room above the bird's head for sure. With good Photoshop skills and some time, you could cure all of those ills, but better to learn the principle and go back out and make a better image.

later and love,

artie