Oystercatcher in flight

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Jonathan
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IMG_9884_Oystercatcher_Barking_Bay_copy.jpg


1/1600 at f4, handheld. Canon eval metering + 2 1/3 stops. 40% crop to get rid of blank sky and position bird in the frame, curves and saturation adjusted, sharpened and saved as jpeg 8, 800px limited.
 
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Great shot. Thanks for the info, I am still on a steep learning curve.
 
Thanks for the comments. When I took it I was well-pleased with the focus and exposure, which is not always straightforward with black and white birds, but on later reflection the image does look flat, and it must be the sky. That said, it is easier to take photos underneath what is effectively a huge diffuser, but you can be left wanting. And of course what little detail there was in the sky disappeared when opening up to properly expose the bird. I wondered about somehow employing some PS magic to turn the sky blue, but decided against it. I'm perfectly happy to get rid of a distracting twig or two, but draw the line at changing the entire circumstances.
I also would have hoped for sharper wingtips at the set shutter speed, but I guess I wobbled too much. As for the beak, either the bird is a 1S, or had been recently probing in the mud.
Regards
Jonathan
 
jalethbridge said:
I also would have hoped for sharper wingtips at the set shutter speed, but I guess I wobbled too much.
Click to expand...

More likely down to the shallow depth of field at f4, get up to f7.1 / f8 for flight shots, the greater depth of field gives you some tolerance on focusing on the moving object (y)

The Oystercatcher always looks better against the contrast of a blue sky, or blue water, it really gives the orange and red a punch, however if we only took photo's when we had a blue sky, we would have a lot of blank days
 
jalethbridge said:
Thanks for the comments. When I took it I was well-pleased with the focus and exposure, which is not always straightforward with black and white birds, but on later reflection the image does look flat, and it must be the sky. That said, it is easier to take photos underneath what is effectively a huge diffuser, but you can be left wanting. And of course what little detail there was in the sky disappeared when opening up to properly expose the bird. I wondered about somehow employing some PS magic to turn the sky blue, but decided against it. I'm perfectly happy to get rid of a distracting twig or two, but draw the line at changing the entire circumstances.
I also would have hoped for sharper wingtips at the set shutter speed, but I guess I wobbled too much. As for the beak, either the bird is a 1S, or had been recently probing in the mud.
Regards
Jonathan
Click to expand...
welcome to bird photography :D mark...
 
Good shot
 
Martyn... said:
More likely down to the shallow depth of field at f4, get up to f7.1 / f8 for flight shots, the greater depth of field gives you some tolerance on focusing on the moving object (y)
Click to expand...

Thanks, that is good advice, I will use it next time, though perhaps only to 5.6, 6.3. At f8, an equivalent exposure would have been 1/400th I think, which would (for me!) have been enough to ensure the wingtips (and many other bits besides) were blurred! There is no such thing as a free lunch is there! Unless it is called a tripod, but here I was standing on a 9ft wall and there was no option but to handhold.

Thanks again
Jonathan
 
jalethbridge said:
Thanks, that is good advice, I will use it next time, though perhaps only to 5.6, 6.3. At f8, an equivalent exposure would have been 1/400th I think, which would (for me!) have been enough to ensure the wingtips (and many other bits besides) were blurred! There is no such thing as a free lunch is there! Unless it is called a tripod, but here I was standing on a 9ft wall and there was no option but to handhold.

Thanks again
Jonathan
Click to expand...

No problem ... bump up the ISO (y) ... there's always Noiseware :D
 
jalethbridge said:
What is noiseware?
Click to expand...

Noise reduction software ... there are others available, Noiseware by Imagenomic is available as a free standalone trial (if you are using Windows), and one I found worked really well with my files (when I switched to Mac I bought the plug in version).

LINK it's the Community Edition you want to try.

There are several others out there, all available as trials (y)
 
Nice capture Johnathan.
As you have ask for C&C.
IMO it is well over-sharpen which is made worse be the contrasting black and white of the feathers and the black against the sky.
Have you generally lightend the image, if so I would have gone for selective lighten and left the sky darker.
Not your fault but it's a pity the head and eye are in shaddow.

Stuart
 
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