The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
Description
On one of our visits to Farewell Spit at the top of the South Island, we again visited a colony of Australasian gannets at the very tip of the spit. This is the only sea-level colony of these gannets and is the feeding ground for many other birds that migrate from western Alaska each year.
While I seldom photograph birds as I don’t have a long enough telephoto lens to satisfactorily do so, on this occasion a gannet flew out from the colony and directly over us to see what we were up to on their patch of the world.
Specific Feedback
Just interested in general appeal, or otherwise, of the image. I feel that the sky looks a bit dark, but at the time it was actually this colour.
A very nice catch but the processing should be revisited. The sky appears dark because the entire image is very underexposed. The histogram is all in the left half of the tonal range, even though it looks like full sun, in which case there should be bright whites. It would pay to have another look at the tonal range in raw conversion. Often in an image like this it is necessary to pull highlights full down and shadows full up, or even resort to a linear profile.
The sky issue isn’t about color, it is about brightness. After sorting that out then the question can be about color. It will change with brightness parameters. Tonalities and colors are not absolute in raw captures. Or in JPEGs, or in film captures, or in our memories of what we think we saw.
Hi Phil, a nice in flight catch with a great view of the underneath of this gannet. Sharpness seems good throughout on the bird. Agree with Diane on increasing brightness on most parts of the image. A fine capture.
Excellent detail, Phil. I agree with brightening the sky and to some extent the bird. Since the bird is backlit, I wouldn’t go too far with it or you’d lose the backlight effect-particularly if you start pulling down the highlights too much. It’s a delicate balance. I also like that you got enough of an angle to get an eye in the image and show a bit of the tan on the head.
What a good image of this graceful bird!
When I first saw the name of it I thought it was supposed to have been spelled Australian rather than Australasian since you live in NZ, it was an easy mistake to make…
We have a city here in the US that sits on the border of three states (Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana) so they named the city “Texarkana”. Officially it’s a Texas city but everyone from here knows immediately that it’s in the corner where those three states meet.
These really are graceful birds while flying but maybe not so much while on the ground
I like the color scheme, the transition between the brownish color to white is smooth and adds to the graceful look.
I like the composition and I like the detail of the feathers from this upward perspective.
Whenever I actually photograph birds in full daylight like this, I always underexpose to prevent having to delete them due to unintentional and unrecoverable blown highlights.
At the same time, I like to keep the exposure a little on the negative side so it isn’t harsh or hard on the eyes, the brightness could be a bit higher in the sky and maybe just a touch on the bird but not to a level that satisfies the histogram. And most important, this is just my personal taste and preference.
That said, my eyes are rather sensitive to bright light so maybe that’s part of it.
Not meaning to disagree with Diane’s comments. She is correct in her assessment of the technicals like the histogram, etc. but for me, it’s more about aesthetics.
I rarely use the computer’s histogram, I usually rely on the histogram in my mind for processing.
I rarely use the camera’s histogram either but I do use the exposure warning feature in the camera (the Zebra exposure feature).
Of course it’s always a good idea to fully understand everything that Dianne mentioned!
Thanks for your comments on this one @Diane_Miller, @Allen_Sparks, and @Dennis_Plank.
I didn’t really like the deep tone in the sky to begin with either, but after lightening it and adjusting the colour somewhat I then sort of liked the higher contrast in the original.
I am happy with the detail in the gannet and decided not to lighten its body any further than I did as I prefer the backlighting effect that appealed to me at the time. I was using an old (10mP) camera to avoid getting windblown sand in my usual cameras, and when I play around with the tones of the birds body and the brightness and colour of the sky it just seems to get blotchy and I start to lose the backlighting effect. Anyway, I guess it will have to do. Thankyou very much for your comment though. Cheers.
Hi Merv
I can just imagine the nightmares that living on a border would cause, especially with the rampant bureaucracy that we have here in NZ. It seems to get worse by the minute
We have always enjoyed watching these gannets as they plunge from quite a height into reasonably shallow water to catch fish. What a way to have to feed your family! As you say, they are graceful, and I tried to capture that by showing a full wingspan while it was gliding above us.
Agree with you about personal taste, but I do also agree with Diane’s comments. I do watch the histogram and try to expose as far to the right as I can without blowing highlights past what I think LR or PS would recover. In this case, the highlighted upper edge of the gannet’s wings and neck were exposed as far as I could go and it got a bit difficult to deal with in PP because it is quite a low resolution file (an old 10mP camera that I used on windblown sandy areas).
Cheers.
