Robin

Gallery: AvianPosted September 24, 2010137 views14 comments

This was taken in some gorgeously soft late afternoon light right next to a visitors' centre in the Brecon Beacon National park, Wales.

The birds were quite tame and people were feeding them, so I couldn't resist shooting a few of them

I cloned some seeds out that were on the stone, the large version shows what it was like before cos I um, meant to clone on that one and then downsize but I did the wrong one first.

Sony A350
Sigma 50-500 EX
1/200th second
f6.3
ISO 400
280mm
-0.3 stop exposure compensation
Centre-weighted metering
Hand held sat by a picnic table
Very slightly cropped

Comments

14 comments

Comment posted by Giorgio Gregori on September 24, 2010 at 1:51 PM

Very nice portrait, with the subject caught raising the feathers. Appreciate sharpness and comp. Personally, would have cropped the OOF part of the stone.
Giorgio

Registered on November 16, 2007, 87 Posts, 793 Comments

Comment posted by Ron Bielefeld on September 24, 2010 at 2:09 PM

Geoffrey, I do like the late light. The sharpness and detail are first rate. Also, it does look better without the seeds. Personally, I like the comp as posted.

Registered on December 6, 2008, 360 Posts, 7132 Comments

Comment posted by Darren Colello on September 24, 2010 at 2:21 PM

Cute little one. Outstanding colours and detail.

Registered on July 27, 2009, 175 Posts, 1100 Comments

Comment posted by Philip Hodgkins on September 24, 2010 at 2:54 PM

Agrre with the crop, sweet photo!

Registered on July 24, 2006, 2741 Posts, 12349 Comments

Comment posted by Mia McPherson on September 24, 2010 at 3:38 PM

Lovely colors Geoffrey and great pose. OOF area of the stone doesn't distract me. Nice light, details & sharpness.

Registered on June 25, 2007, 491 Posts, 12566 Comments

Comment posted by Joel DeYoung on September 24, 2010 at 4:33 PM

Nice light and great details. Good job with the cloning. OOF area doesn't bother or distract IMHO. Well done.

Registered on July 12, 2009, 92 Posts, 1074 Comments

Comment posted by Ron Dudley on September 24, 2010 at 5:56 PM

Agreed, the light is gorgeous Geoff and your comp works fine by me. The bird is beautifully presented. Don't like the seeds much in the larger version though...

Registered on March 30, 2007, 437 Posts, 10915 Comments

Comment posted by Doug Gilham on September 24, 2010 at 6:29 PM

Beautiful. Definately clone the seeds before archiving IMO. Great capture!

Registered on September 20, 2009, 77 Posts, 489 Comments

Comment posted by Dennis Plank on September 25, 2010 at 12:05 AM

Nice job on the cloning, Geoffrey and it is some gorgeous light. To my eye, it looks like a bit more dof might have been nice, but at the shutter speed you were at, it might have been the looser feathers blowing-was there a wind?

Registered on January 28, 2008, 1767 Posts, 23192 Comments

Comment posted by Nate Chappell on September 25, 2010 at 12:13 AM

The bg goes beautifully with the bird's colors here Geoffrey. I like it without the seeds and I agree with Giorgio on cropping a little more from the bottom to remove most of the out of focus part of the rock.

Registered on February 1, 2006, 1158 Posts, 19528 Comments

Comment posted by Geoffrey Baker on September 25, 2010 at 5:40 AM

Thanks everyone

Yes Dennis, there was a slight breeze, just enough to lift a few feathers.

I would have chosen f8 if I could have but as I was hand holding the "Bigma" I was aware of my shutter speed and only having a relatively cheap entry level camera with the old CCD sensor I knew that 400 ISO was my limit.
I had to run this through Neat Image to clean up the noise which probably lost me some detail

I'm waiting for Sony to release the replacement for it's A700, (I need live view for my macro and landscape work which the A700 doesn't have) then it will be like starting all over for me, I'll have the freedom to choose a higher ISO when necessary, giving me the choice of greater DOF, and I'll have more than just the one central cross-hair, oh, and more than my current 2.5 frames per second which is useless, I can't wait

Geoff.

Registered on August 20, 2010, 192 Posts, 980 Comments

Comment posted by Rob Drummond on September 25, 2010 at 6:34 AM

Lovely detail and light Geoffrey - agree with removing the seeds

cheers
Rob

Registered on November 8, 2003, 617 Posts, 8267 Comments

Comment posted by Jim Hackley on September 25, 2010 at 1:17 PM

Very nice feather detail and that background really makes the bird pop. I also perfer the image without the seeds but a wonderful shot, well done.

Registered on September 17, 2009, 302 Posts, 5535 Comments

Comment posted by May Haga on September 29, 2010 at 5:25 PM

Wow, wonderful image.
May

Registered on February 22, 2007, 714 Posts, 8470 Comments