How is the composition? I was not sure about the crop, I was not particularly looking to include the reflection, but cutting it off felt wrong too. Is the fish too small? Is he sharp? I do see a little piece of background that almost looks like it is growing out of his back, but I am interested in submitting this to my local’s clubs nature competition, so I can’t remove it.
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
Nikon Z8 with Nikon 200-500 f/5.6 lens
I’m interested in submitting this under nature category in my local club, so I can’t remove anything. I did darken the background, bring the highlights down in the background, and reduce the saturation in the background. Also used NIK Pro Contract on him.
Good timing, Elizabeth. Fine action shot with good detail. I can tell the heron is about to swallow something, though I can’t quite make out what it is-my first thought was a frog.
I belong to a camera club as well. Fortunately we don’t have restrictions on removing objects; we just can’t add anything. You might try to reduce the background highlights a bit more as the color is quite close the heron’s. I like the reflections as well and the color of the water.
@Allen_Brooks For my club, the rules vary by the category. Nature has restrictions, pictoral does not, but you can’t submit more than 2 in any one category. I’ll try your suggestion with the background, thanks.
This is a difficult image, with the tonalities of the heron so well matched by those in the BG. Maybe you can select the heron and darken the BG considerably. I would suggest a CW rotation to level the ripples, if you have enough room on the sides to re-crop.
Nice catch Elizabeth. The fish looks sharp to me. A fine feeding pose as the bird flips the fish. The whites on the bird’s head and neck look slightly hot to me. Also agree with the clockwise rotation suggestion.
Thank you @Allen_Sparks@Allen_Brooks@Diane_Miller for the suggestions! I will work on it and repost. As I look at it again, I’m wondering if the white balance is off a bit too.
An interesting image, Elizabeth and as others have noted a difficult one to process. Summer-fall ponds with lily pads get so messy. We have a great duck pond locally, but after early spring it’s very difficult to get a really nice image out of it. I agree with @Diane that this image could use some clockwise rotation. My personal preference would be for cropping up some from the bottom as the reflection doesn’t contribute much.
I hadn’t thought about it but it does lean toward blue-magenta a bit. The histogram you posted with the info shows a blue spike – that is more complicated than meaning there is a blue cast, but you can watch it change as you move the Temp and Tint sliders.
Nice action shot Elizabeth. Great to catch the GBH with it’s mouth open and working to swallow. You’ve received some expert advice on things you could work with on this, so I don’t have anything else to add.
I tried to incorporate everyone’s suggestions into my repost. Thoughts? I made the white balance cloudy since it was a rainy day. I think I initially thought that was too greenish and played with it but probably a bad idea.
WB looks right now – I didn’t notice how far off it was – our eyes/brains correct things and it can be difficult to see when something is off. The “horizon” is still not quite level – a ripple is always level and a good clue, or a reflection that is not too distorted.
@Diane_Miller I posted another one. It came out a little differently because I backed way up before the crop so I could see the full ripples. I realized his feet are not at the center, it is where he pulled the fish out. I tried to go from edge to edge on the full size ripple to level … it is not as obvious to me as it is to you in the crop. THANK YOU
