This powerful-looking raptor spends quite a bit of time in my yard. I occasionally see him capture a snake or hunting mice in the grass, and generally appearing like he owns the place.
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Any. I wish those two small branches weren’t there, but at least they frame the bird somewhat.
Technical Details
Is this a composite: No
Canon 60D, Canon 70-300mm IS USM Zoom @ 200mm, f/6.7, 1/1000 sec., ISO 2000. Processed in ACR and PSE 2020 for exposure and cropping. Topaz De-noise applied. I applied a luminosity mask in an attempt to tame those bg highlights.
Oooh how wonderful! The stare down is so intense! The branches…well, they are what they are, but I think you brought the exposure and highlights down too much. It looks muddy and underexposed. I’d lift everything back up and then work on adding some detail in those marvelous feathers!
Good image, Terry. I don’t mind the framing branches. The hawk dominates in the larger version and to me they become a non-issue. I prefer the original to the repost. Bringing up the hawk and trying to get more detail out of the feathers just accentuated the noise in the bird. I don’t think the image quality supports trying to bring out a lot more detail, so I’d leave it as in the original. You could try bringing the exposure of the bird up just a little-maybe half way between the original and the repost.
I agree with Dennis on this image with respect to the exposure. A little less the second one I think you would be right there. You might try to use the spot healing brush on one of the branches just to see what happens. It can be a lot of work but you might be able to get rid of it. I never fail to be surprised at how well this tool works.
@David_Schoen@Dennis_Plank Thanks, guys. I feel like Goldilocks. Perhaps this third one will be juuust right. I tried a more global luminosity mask this time, rather than just adjusting the bird.
A wonderful visitor to have! Challenging lighting but not impossible. Instead of lightning the bird with a tight selection, I’d try brushing the light area in more naturally without trying to separate the bird sharply from the BG. I brushed on a quick mask here and used a curve to lighten the bird. Also added a bit more canvas at the bottom.
I’ve had better luck doing a denoise before doing enough lighenting to bring out much noise.
Thanks, Dennis. I did try removing the two small branches as @David_Schoen suggested, and PSE did a pretty good job except the brc along his wing. It left some artifacts there. Maybe I just need a bit more practice.
