Nice shot, Don. I love the cactus patterns. The bird is a bit soft. When I was shooting with a dslr, I used the smallest focus area available for shots like this and tried to put it on the bird’s head-hard to do hand held. If you’re shooting a modern mirrorless, most of them now have bird-eye AF, which can work absolute wonders (sometimes).
What a wonderful catch!! The bird does match the perch so nicely. I love how the smooth green areas in the cactus almost match the BG. It would be fun to make them match even more closely!
I love the composition but also agree that a crop from the left could work. Without eye AF this would have been a difficult one to nail, as those thorns are so attractive to the earlier AF algorithms. Other than lacking a few bells and whistles, DSLRs are still excellent for solid classical work.
Hi Don, really interesting photo. I like the patterns in the cactus as an added element to the bird. As Dennis mentions, focus has seemed to land on the rightmost part of the cactus rather than the bird. Agree with trying a crop in from the left.
