Black Skimmer Skimming and REWORK

Rework:

Original:

Critique Style Requested: Standard

The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.

Description

From last week’s Florida trip - a black skimmer fishing at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. I got one reasonable shot from inside the car where the mirror wasn’t blocking part of the bird, I couldn’t get out of the car as we were in a slow-moving line with two tow trucks and no room to open the door.

Specific Feedback

The blurred-out car mirror blocked the left side of this image and I tried to remove the darkness with PS generative fill. It’s still dark, and after trying a linear gradient in LrC to up the exposure and a few things in PS, I don’t know how to improve that area.

Technical Details

Fuji X-H2S, 1/2500s, f/9, ISO 2000, 346mm

Fujinon XF 150-600 and 1.4 TC

Processed in Lightroom and Photoshop


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Great timing on this shot, to get the skimmer skimming. Details look sharp. I don’t mind the darkness in the LLC and wonder if darkening the right side some would let the skimmer pop more. Also, the skimmer seems a bit centered and I wonder how it would look with a crop from the right and adding a bit of canvas on the left. Anyway, a great shot and one I’d be more than happy to have in my collection.

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Hi Debbie. Nice job on the skimmer, particularly for the conditions you had. For the adjustments you want my favorite tool would be the LR adjustments as you can see real time what’s being done. I downloaded your image and opened it in the LR development module. I used a linear gradient coming in from the lower left at an angle to try to get most of the lower left corner and raised the exposure quite a bit. It was still a bit dark in a small part of the corner and I just added a local adjustment brush over that area with a very large feather to boost it a touch more. I didn’t do anything about it, but you might use the local adjustment brush to bring down the very brightest whites under the wing to see if you can bring out a touch more detail without turning it too gray. Just bring down the highlights a trifle and maybe try giving the texture slider a bit of a boost.

Here’s what the water looked like after I played with it:

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@Dennis_Plank and @Allen_Brooks - thank you! I went back into Lr, did the gradient in the left corner and used a brush to lighten up that area in the very bottom left. Then in Ps I cropped to the right and expanded the water area on the left side. I also tried to darken the bright white under the wing a bit. I like these changes.

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I like the repost. I think having more room to “skim” into helps.

@Allen_Brooks Thanks! Me too.