Hang tight

Image Critiques Avian Critiques
1

Spring is in full swing here in Southern California. The terns are back and they are keeping me busy. Now, I am undecided if this is a pair of elegant terns or royal terns. I am inclined towards royal terns since most of our breeding elegant terns have a pinkish shade on their chests. Anyway, this pair is about to mate and I thought this head-on shot is quite engaging. The white strip in the BG is waves breaking.

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Recropped to remove some of the sandy FG:

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What technical feedback would you like if any?

Any. It is impossible to isolate a pair since they live in a colony. I am pretty lucky with this one because they have a little bit more space around them but I still have cloned out two birds: one on the right edge of the frame and one flying in the sky.

What artistic feedback would you like if any?

Any. The beach is not quite level and I am not perpendicular to the line of the incoming wave. I have copied a layer of the image, warped the “virtual horizon” from the wave, and mask it to the right-hand-side of the image to make it appear to be level.

Pertinent technical details or techniques:

(If backgrounds have been removed, etc. please be honest with your techniques to help others learn)
Nikon D500 and Nikkor 300mm f/4PF and 1.4x TC, 1/2000, f/5.6, ISO 800.

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@adhikalie

You may only download this image to demonstrate post-processing techniques.
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Nicely timed shot Adhika. Your settings have resulted in a nice, sharp image with the wings of the ‘landing’ bird captured in a nice moment.

I wonder if the image could benefit from a little crop off the bottom of the image - the amount of foreground feels slightly overemphasised to me in comparison to the amount of sky above the wing tips. - though the fact it is out of focus helps.

1 Like
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Thanks, Rob. Yes, indeed, should have cropped tighter with the FG. I have added the re-cropped version to my original post. I think it works a lot better now.

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Good job on the re-crop. It still keeps the very effective depth of field. Excellent point of view.

1 Like