Question

[ndwgolf]

Curious to what you guys think about busy backgrounds. Below is a picture of a cattle egret coming into land but in the frame there is also a lot going on, had the little one with the fancy hair do been the only other one in the frame then that could have possibly been a wow picture………..so my question is do the other birds in the frame add to the picture or just make it too busy?

 

[Dale.]

I like my clean backgrounds. This is way too busy for me. The birds touching the edge of the frame I find distracting and taking my eye out of the image. I would crop in on the landing Egret, leaving it some space to move into though. This would eliminate some of the clutter. The white halo (though I think it's a bird behind the Egret's head) is also distracting. Also, the brighter and sharp Egret, bottom left takes my eye from the main subject. I have a mantra (99% of the time), make it all about the subject. My eye is all over the frame, looking for somewhere to settle.

Some cloning would help but then it becomes less of a wildlife image.

This is where one of the challenges lie with wildlife, getting a nice, mushy background. Something as simple as moving to your right or left can completely change it. Apart from the soft birds in your image, the background itself is quite nice.

That said, there is nothing wrong with habitat shots, with other species in them, it's all a bit subjective.

 

[arturo7]

I like it. It adds context.

 

[Petrochemist]

To my eye the birds at the bottom are fine adding context, but the grey one above and the severely out of focus one with a strong reflection do detract from the shot somewhat.
Like Dale I found the halo around the subjects head distracting, it made me think of over sharpening artifacts, but having subsequently read Dales comments I'm sure his interpretation is far more likely to be correct. Cloning some of it to make the shape less similar to the subject might help, without needing as much selection skill as removing it completely...

 

[Craikeybaby]

I think it depends on if it adds to the story or not.

 

[Harlequin565]

I think that it depends. Mostly on who your audience is (client, judge, followers, or just you), what you like, and what you're trying to say with your picture.

For me, it adds context save for the unfortunate position of the oof bird behind your main subject's head. Gives me the sense of a busy lake with lots of comings and goings. I'm not a wildlife photographer though, so have a completely different perception.

 

[Sangoma]

I did a quick (messy) edit (you've said no edits, so can't add it ) and I prefer it with just the landing bird and the one flying just above it.