Two Caspian Terns in close contact. Caught this recently when there were many scenes of Terns with fish in their bills, being chased by others. But no fish to steal here. Not sure if they were playing or fighting, but there weren’t any feathers flying!
All I can think of is a beautiful dance.
Specific Feedback Requested
Any and all comments!
I brightened this up as I was thinking the high-key look worked well for an ethereal look.
Technical Details
Is this a composite: No
1/200 second, f/8, ISO 140, 340mm using D500 with 200-500 f/5.6 lens, ISO
Brightened this up a bit in LR, and lightened the shadows in the wing tips. Over to Topaz Denoise for some cleanup, and then some further brightening for the high-key look.
A great capture of gold-medal synchronized flying! The square crop suits it well, and the position of the two bills could not be improved. If possible, I’d move the birds a wee bit to the left. Super shot!
The exposure and comp is excellent. I’m not a big fan of motion blur and wish for more crispness especially on the head region of the two terns. Creatively, it is a wonderful image…Jim
Beautiful, Mark. The relative positions of the two terns is perfect. I agree with Mike about moving them slightly left (or cropping a tad off the left). Excellent work.
Hi Mark
Nice timing on the action of these two terns and I like the framing. It did not look like Topaz Denoise did you any favors. ( looking a the close, there is a lot of digital noise). Maybe Topaz was trying stop the motion blur. 1/200 is to slow for these birds 1/2000 or faster is needed.
Peter
@Mike_Friel , @Vanessa_Hill@Allen_Brooks , @Dennis_Plank , @Jim_Zablotny , and @peter , Thank you very much for your feedback. I can see the need for better centering!
Jim, I too wish for more sharpness in the head region, a challenge I constantly strive to achieve while retaining the wing blur, but it is elusive with such a slow shutter speed. Thanks for being willing to view and comment, though not your favorite style.
Peter, thanks for spotting the trouble with Topaz. I’m always afraid of doing too much noise reduction in Topaz, but I guess in this case I didn’t do enough. Yes, the faster shutter speed will get everything sharp, but in this case I purposely set it super slow to get the wing blur/motion blur. It’s a trade-off though, as Jim points out, with the relatively still head area still not as sharp as I’d like.
Great moment Mark and full-on impact in small size. Big size however, does show, as said, the shutter speed that is too slow and the noise too present. I personally think that if you boost ISO and shutter speed, Topaz Denoise will do a much better job. But great timing and very nice shot!
