What technical feedback would you like if any? Any/All
What artistic feedback would you like if any? Any/All
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
I had the good fortune to have this Red-tail fly up and land in a tree right at the edge of the little country road I was driving on and, for some reason it allowed me to stop, grab my camera and shoot it. Maybe it was just sick of flying in the rain. It didn’t look like it was having any fun. It was probably giving me a, “What are you looking at?!” look. Shot with my D500, Nikon 2-500 lens, Nikon 1.4 TC, 1/500th, f/8.0, ISO 200, 550mm, cropped to 3200 x 3712, hand held
David,
exposure looks good on bird in challenging light.
A lot of your photos are looking up pretty steep at birds.
I would try for more eye level photos.
I agree with Dan, you were dealing with less than favorable lighting. Though, that doesn’t slow me down too much. Sometimes I resort to flash if I am within range.
I’m wondering if some additional post-processing would help lighten this guy up some?
Not a bad image and you really got lucky getting this guy up close!
I just spend a very few minutes with your image. In CS5 using shadow/highlight tool to make the bird brighter. A light touch up of the head with ‘dodge’ in CS5.
Some may not like what I did…but it gives you an idea what I mean.
I like it. Up to now I have not been very experimental with my images. I might manipulate the lights and darks but treating the whole image in doing so. I’m getting lots of good input from this forum on possible treatments. Thanks!
A nice wet hawk, Dave. Jim gave you some nice direction to go to.
A couple of things you can do when the angle is steep: Watch for a head turn with the head tilted down toward you to create a more face-on composition. It can be a profile, but looking directly at the face minimizes the effect of the steep angle. Also, when you compose the image,a bit of extra space above the bird helps give the illusion that the angle isn’t as steep.
We keep making suggestions that would usually be implemented in Photoshop, but I know a lot of people these days seem to do all their processing in Lightroom or other packages, such as On 1. It would be helpful to know what you’re using for processing.
Dave, you have shown some pretty good work here. This is a great forum with many good photographers who regularly offer good, constructive advice to you and others who participate here. I would strongly encourage you to recipricate by offering your own comments to others in exchange for comments you receive. Please bear in mind this is an interactive community of like minded people who expect to get comments from other members, yourself included. Please don’t be afraid to offer comments, because in doing so you will find it is an excellent way to improve your work.
Thanks for this advice. I’ve been quiet on communicating with with the critics thinking it to be kind’ve a one-way deal plus I have not wanted to appear to be too sensitive to criticism by defending my work in any way. You’ve caused me to rethink. I will perhaps start respectfully responding if the situation warrants it, in the spirit of communicating, and learning, and not arguing. ‘Preciate ya!
Thanks for this. Greedy guy that I am, when possible I try to respectfully get closer to subjects while shooting them and that sometimes causes me to be looking up into a tree, not at eye level. I won’t not take the shot just because it’s from below so these points you give are taken. I mostly use LR on files, sometimes PS to clone out unwanted stuff, and I’ve just now (thanks to you guys!) learned about Topaz and some very cool stuff it lets me do. I will start to divulge my use of these things when I utilize them. I am so glad to have found out about this highly useful site. I continue to sponge up things that I get off of it, not only on comments on my work, but other submission responses as well. BIG thank you to you guys.
You’re welcome, Dave. I’d appreciate it if you’d start commenting on other’s work as well. As the briefing on commenting states, you don’t need to be an expert-none of us started out as experts and I still don’t consider myself more than marginally competent. You just have to look at the images and try to figure out why you like them or what bothers you about them. Eventually, you’ll figure out what you might do differently to improve the image and you can start making suggestions that way. But at least let people know whether an image grabs you or leaves you cold, and if possible, why.
