Description: While photographing redwing blackbirds and various ducks, I saw this sandhill crane carefully traversing a portion of thin ice that was covering thhe inshore areas of the marsh. Unfortunately, I wish that I was better prepared and should have bumped up the ISO to compensate for the light BG. The shadows were heavily saturated in blue and cyan so I adjusted the saturation of the colors down and just left a hint of them in the BG. This photo shows the harshness of early spring as these birds spend most of their time hunting for food like snails, leeches, and worms in exposed mud of the marsh.
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Pertinent technical details or techniques: D850, 600mm f4 (1/2000 sec at f8.0, ISO 1250), Topaz DeNoise AI, Levels, Hue and Saturation, Shadow and Highlights, Brightness & Saturation, Adobe Camera Raw filter with slightly more noise reduction, crop for comp. If I was on the ball, most of these salvaging techniques would not be necessary…Jim
Is this a composite? (focus stacks or exposure blends are not considered composites)
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Oh very neat. Sure the technicals may not have been the best, but the final result has some lovely detail and light. Plus we get to see a little of those fabulous legs. If it ever gets warm I can see if any come my way - I have plans to visit a bird / wildlife sanctuary with lots of marshy bits and walkways.
Oh and I got a spot on an outing to see Whooping cranes. I’ve been trying to get a spot on one of these for years, but finally got one. It won’t be for another month, but I’m so excited. I’ve never seen a whooper before! Of course we might not see any, but it is in the sanctuary where they nest here in Wisconsin and naturalists that work with them are leading the outing so I’m hopeful.
You got a wonderful image despite the difficulties. I would never have known you had to do any corrections at all. The DOF is great, light on the bird is lovely and the raised foot tells the story of its hunting. You also got it at a lovely angle. They can look a bit awkward from some angles.
All considering the situation, this turned out great. Depth of field is superb. Making any further changes might not improve the image. I could see a little more contrast on the bird itself but that would be hard to achieve considering the background. We don’t often get opportunities like this and when looking for other birds, we can’t always be as prepared as we would like.
Hi Jim
I think you did a vary good job on recovering the color balance and Diane is correct on the raised foot, it does add the this Sandhill Crane drama. Nice looking Crane.
Peter
