Hairy Woodpecker

I like the graphics of this and the very interesting textures. But you didn't have enough depth of field for this to work: only the nearer tree trunk is in focus. A higher ISO setting would have allowed the lens to be stoped down for more DOF, and the point of focus should hve been on the woodpecker.

Hilke, I like the vertical orientation of all three major elements - bird and two trunks and the contrasting textures of the two trees is appealing. But I agree that there's a DOF/softness issue here.

Hilke,

Ron D. and Rich D. have already addressed the issues I see in this image. I like the bird among the tree trunks, the different patterns and the soft greens in the background.

I think I would crop just a little bit from the left and the right to remove the green bg there Hilke. Is this cropped a lot? I'm seeing a fair amount of loss of detail in the bird and I'm not sure if it's a focus/dof or cropping issue. If it's cropped quite a bit and you have more room on top and bottom I would include more room there.

Thanks for all your comments. It's cropped to about 1/6th of the entire area. I sharpened it as much as I could without causing artifact. I usually set my ISO at 400 to 800; the setting of 200 was left over from a previous shoot. I should go through a checklist before each session :-)