Hot-Crested Cardinal

Gallery: AvianPosted June 9, 2013237 views6 comments

This Northern Cardinal was perched in a tree earlier this Spring. The morning sun was behind it, creating some problems. It lit up the crest, which I like, and also created the halo-ish look on the right wing of the bird--I tried doing what I could there in PP. It posed long enough for me to get this capture. D90, ISO-400, 1/250th, f-8, 500mm. Curious to see what it looks like here, with a the resulting crop. C&C welcomed of course.

Comments

6 comments

Comment posted by Patrick O'Healy on June 10, 2013 at 10:50 AM

Good catch. I spent many days in New Jersey last month photographing them. Hard to get without offending branches.

Registered on March 13, 2011, 326 Posts, 1679 Comments

Comment posted by Keith Bauer on June 10, 2013 at 11:29 AM

Bill:

Tough lighting to deal with. Looks like you did pretty well. You didn't say if you used fill flash, but this would a perfect time to help control the dynamic range and contrast. The overall scene doesn't bother me, but the flowers and stems directly behind the head are really bothersome for me.

Registered on November 20, 2003, 458 Posts, 4836 Comments

Comment posted by John Tobias on June 10, 2013 at 12:50 PM

Nice work to get detail in the cardinal with the light you had to work with, and not loose the BG. I do think you could crop some off of the right side. Thanks for sharing.

Registered on September 12, 2009, 2120 Posts, 6455 Comments

Comment posted by Dennis Plank on June 10, 2013 at 6:31 PM

Nice job on the post processing, Bill. It looks pretty good for being shot directly into the sun. I do like the sun through the crest.

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

Comment posted by Buck Ward on June 10, 2013 at 6:32 PM

I like the hot red! Also, it looks like he's wearing his Sunday-go-to-meeting hat

Registered on December 8, 2003, 96 Posts, 1917 Comments

Comment posted by Bill Maile on June 11, 2013 at 9:07 AM

Thanks folks, this was a fairly frequent visitor to my backyard. I had to "stealthily" walk barefoot down my gravel driveway early one day to get even this close (it feels like I'm walking on stones with shoes on anyway). Ideally, no flowers/branches behind its head, yes. One of my main goals was to get the eye visible while still shooting into the light. I think that came out OK. Probably post another of this guy. (Buck, the bright red crest reminded me of the "Heat Miser" in the old Christmas cartoon classic, lol.)

Registered on March 2, 2009, 984 Posts, 2518 Comments