One from February 2021 when we had a nice snowstorm (not in my wife’s opinion). I spent a fair amount of time in my bird blind which tends to be quite productive when we have snow as I do feed in the winter.
Feedback Requests
I’m interested in how I might bring out the texture of the foreground snow a bit more. I adjusted the texture up with a linear gradient and lowered highlights a bit, but it didn’t have as much effect as I had hoped.
Pertinent Technical Details
Sony A7Riv, FE 200-600 @ 600 mm, tripod with gimbal, f/8, 1/500, iso 1600. Processed in LR & PS CC. Cropped to 8013x5650. Taken February 13th, 2021 in the snow.
This is gorgeous, Dennis. I wouldn’t have thought of more texture in the fg if you hadn’t mentioned it. I’m not sure what program you use, but in Lightroom, I would add to the linear gradient to boost clarity just a tish (up to 3 or 4) and maybe darken shadows on that same gradient to see what that does. Easy enough to back out if it doesn’t add to the image.
Which takes me to my main bit of feedback: I absolutely love the current colors and tonalities. That beautiful bokeh in the background, and that little hill of snow the bird is sitting on. I’m not sure that more texture in the foreground is going to add to the image. It has all it needs as presented.
ML
Dennis: You’ve made a fairly simple common bird into a really compelling image. That little snowflake on its beak is icing on a very fine cake. Most excellent. >=))>
What a wonderful and sweet capture. Great detail on the darling little bird. Background is nicely blurred. I would like to see the dark area center right lightened some. It seems to draw my eye. I love how you’ve captured the snowflakes and the piece of snow in the bird’s beak is such a nice touch. Absolutely wonderful image.
I think this is a top notch image Dennis! The little brown bird stands out so well against that gorgeous bakcground. If you hadn’t mentioned the foreground I would not have noticed the lack of detail. But it doesn’t worry me one little bit.
@Marylynne_Diggs does have a good suggestion if you wanted to play.
Dennis, this is a fine catch on this Junco. Love the falling flakes and the bits stuck to its beak. To get more “texture” in the snow (and the bird’s belly), try burning-in through an L1 minus L3 luminosity mask. That will darken the middle whites while leaving the brightest whites mosly alone.
Thanks for the comments and input @Chris_Baird@Jim_Gavin@Glenys_Passier@Bill_Fach@Marylynne_Diggs and @Mark_Seaver. I played around with suggestions and other options and found what the effect I wanted by selecting the area and using my old favorite-the Topaz Detail sliders selected for highlights. I used to have a stand alone plugin, but with the last computer change, it didn’t want to work, so now I have to go to my Studio 2 plug-in which still works just fine. It’s the only function I still use, but it still is simpler than any other solution I’ve found.
