So it’s been absolutely lousy for shooting this month. Basically frozen mud, overcast skies, cold temps and high winds. I’m sick of it already, but there is an upside.
Loons in the backyard. This one gave me a wave from about 30 feet off the riverbank. They’re so used to humans and human activity on this bit of river that they’re pretty blase about us. So when I saw a pair coming close while eating dinner, I downed fork and picked up camera.
This is from last week which is what the description says, but not the tag so…confused face.
Specific Feedback Requested
I’m still not happy with this image, but it’s a lot of factors - the white balance was tough, it was a little noisy, but nothing too bad. Good sharpness, but sort of muddy in tonalities. I did my best.
Technical Details
Is this a composite: No
Handheld
Lr for initial processing including the usual for white balance, lens correction, a lift in shadows, whites and exposure, decreased highlights. A bit of a crop and rotation. Some noise reduction and sharpening, but then into Topaz Sharpen for the rest. I tested with running it through DeNoise first, but this result is better. Still experimenting with it, but so far that holds. When I got it back to Lr I decided on a B&W conversion and masked the bird to lift the exposure in the water.
Cool! Interesting choice for B/W but effective. Very nice reflection. Tonalities look OK to me, but I wonder about a little more detail in the head, but I’m pretty sure it’s dark and velvety. I wonder about cropping just a little top, left and bottom, to get the head off center a bit.
I’ve seen Mute Swans cruising around like this. I always wonder if they are trying to tell me something…
Nice, detailed shot of this loon, Kristen. The b&w works pretty well because of the patterns of it’s plumage but I would be interested in seeing the color version. The thing with the leg is something I see quite frequently with the Trumpeter swans here. Not sure why they do it though. The first time I saw that I thought the swan was injured but it quit holding the leg up after a few minutes and didn’t show any sign of injury when it was out of the water.
Thanks @David_Bostock, @Diane_Miller & @Gary_Minish - I did the b&w conversion because the original color just looked too weird to me no matter what I did. Could be a victim of ‘looked at it too long and can no longer see it’ syndrome. If I get brave maybe I’ll post that one. I hadn’t noticed the head was centered, but maybe I can recrop as well. It is a decent, but frustrating image.
I wonder if it has to do with temperature regulation, the foot thing. I’ve seen swans do it and these guys too and sometimes it’s during preening, but this one wasn’t doing that. Maybe when they are active they need a way to cool off so getting one foot out of the water might help.
@Kris_Smith I like this as a black and white, especially for the initial impact of the patterns. I think this one looks kind of like a figure skater with one leg in the air. I think I had a very dull week compared to quite a few other people. I went by the description too rather than the tag, so hopefully that was correct.
Thanks @karlag - they are such striking birds. Haven’t seen one in the last few days, but they’re around. A dull week here, too. It’s raining again today. Hope to get out mid-week if it stops and if it doesn’t freeze.
Thanks @Jim_Zablotny - I love the foot thing they do. Perusing a couple of loon behavior websites didn’t get me any definite answers for why they do this, but the temperature regulation possibility was there as well as just a general stretch behavior.
I went by the description too rather than the tag, so hopefully that was correct.