First sighting - Great Kiskadee plus Revision

I recently returned from a trip to the Lower Rio Grand Valley of Texas. I didn’t come back with any stellar images but I do have some that I believe to be share worthy. It was fun to see birds that I’d never seen before. This Great Kiskadee was at the S. Padre Island Birding Center. I couldn’t tell what it had in it’s mouth until I got it on the computer.

What technical feedback would you like if any? This is a fairly significant crop which has caused loss of IQ, especially in the detail in the whites (whites were not blown). Even at that I had to remove some limbs around the edges. Is this evident?

What artistic feedback would you like if any?

Any pertinent technical details: Canon 7DII, 100-400 II @400mm, 1/500, f5.6, ISO 500

You may only download this image to demonstrate post-processing techniques.

I like the composition with very good perch and the food in the mouth is certainly a plus. Yes, even with the loss of image quality I like looking at this bird. Certainly something we don’t get in the Pacific Northwest.

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Sure Sandy. Always open for that. Thanks.

Pretty good for 400 mm, Terri. They’re not easy to get all that close to. The prey is a nice bonus. I don’t see any artifacts of your cloning, so nice job there. The yellows look a little lighter than I remember, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in the sun.

This is a lot better than my first shot of this species, which was almost straight overhead on a wire!

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Nice feeding capture. A striking bird. Nice isolation on the subject. If mine, I might try placing the bird lower in the frame.

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It looks fine for a big crop,
I would like to have this in my files…

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Thanks Sandy for taking the time to edit. I like your idea of angling the branch more. The crop was already pretty extreme so I’m reluctant to remove more pixels because I do think that shows up in the feather detail. Your revision also showed that I could use more contrast. So I made some changes to accomplish that and a few other things - brightening the eye, lowering clarity in the background, etc.