The Eagle has landed

Gallery: AvianPosted January 31, 2012128 views4 comments

Bald Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) at touchdown on the perch near the nest. The setting sun is to the left giving the warm tones.

Cluttering branches, including one that ran across the bird's body, were cloned away. I left some branches to indicate the habitat.

Canon 7D, Sigma 150-500 at 500 mm, ISO 800, 1/1250 sec at f/11. Cropped to about 50 % and PP in LR3 with cloning in PS4.

This is as close as I could get. For now, I'm thinking about a (Sigma) 1.4 TC. Any experiences with that lens and a 1.4? I know I will lose 1 stop and the autofocus (7D body).

All C & Cs appreciated. Thanks.

Comments

4 comments

Comment posted by John Blumenkamp on February 1, 2012 at 1:59 AM

I really like the wing position, and the direction and quality of light is nice here Roger. I guess you could play with cloning the upper branch (and touching up the feathers) to see how this might look without it at the top of the frame.

Registered on February 26, 2011, 58 Posts, 313 Comments

Comment posted by Ron Bielefeld on February 1, 2012 at 8:15 AM

Roger, I like the bird's position. Your exposure looks good. I can see some of your cloning work above and to the left of the head in the blue BG and the brown area on the bird moving up from the bird's neck does not look right to my eye. Looking at your techs I might have opened up some to say f/8 and thus decreased my ISO. ISO 800 on the 7D can be pretty noisy with a 50% crop. Did you apply noise reduction to the image?

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

Comment posted by SandyRichardsBrown on February 2, 2012 at 10:10 PM

Lovely light and pose. I'd personally go a little further with the cloning, and get rid of the top branch too. A couple dust (?) spots below the neck, and the cloning remnants could easily be cleaned up.
Really nice image!
Sandy

Registered on November 24, 2003, 3937 Posts, 12909 Comments

Comment posted by Roger Kirchen on February 4, 2012 at 12:51 PM

Thanks John, Ron and Sandy for your comments and suggestions. I will try removing the top branch and clean up the past editing. Or start fresh with the original capture. I have a hard time deciding on the right amount of sharpening to apply. The image was oversharpened at one time and then I backed off - too much apparently. A repost will follow in a few days.

Reminder to myself: Keep adjusting ISO and f-stop more frequently when out there.

Registered on March 6, 2011, 95 Posts, 847 Comments