Yellow-crowned Bishop

Gallery: AvianPosted August 2, 2014137 views7 comments

August 2, 2014 Irvine, California

Several of these birds, natives of Africa, have been spotted the past few weeks in Southern California. It has been introduced to Florida according to Wikipedia. How they got here is a mystery. Today is the first time I have seen one. This fellow was a willing subject, albeit not in the best light.

Nikon D4 Nikkor 600mm ISO 500 1/1250 f/8 RAW White Balance Auto Processed in Lightroom, PSCC14, NIK and TK.

Please let me know if I have missed something. Your comments are appreciated.

Comments

7 comments

Comment posted by SandyRichardsBrown on August 2, 2014 at 10:15 PM

Terrific image - great pose, nice diagonal perch, and the oof grasses add a lot. The large version seems a touch soft - maybe some additional structure from viveza?

Sandy

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

Comment posted by Ken Watkins on August 3, 2014 at 1:12 AM

Patrick,
I have seen fairly few of these in Africa, now I know where they have gone

I agree with Sandy, that it looks slightly soft, is it a large crop?

Registered on December 15, 2010, 1537 Posts, 4877 Comments

Comment posted by Charles Gangas on August 3, 2014 at 8:56 AM

Great bird and nicely composed image Patrick. I too notice the issues mentioned in the LP.

Registered on August 12, 2009, 544 Posts, 2414 Comments

Comment posted by John Launstein on August 3, 2014 at 6:55 PM

Patrick: this is a great shot of a striking bird! I like your comp here, though am curious about a similar comp with slightly more room all-around. It does have the appearance of being a fairly large crop, which might explain the slight lack of overall sharpness and drop from the normally excellent levels of IQ your images have. It's still very good, don't get me wrong...the details just don't pop as much as I'm used to seeing in your images. I also noticed a very slight dark halo above the bishop's head (and behind his head as well to a lesser degree). While I'm nit-picking away here

the yellows look a little hot in places on the two screens I viewed this on. I haven't been able to check this on my main monitor today, but I think some adjustments to the yellows could make a big difference in bringing some detail back in if they aren't blown (how do you blow a yellow channel in RGB?)

I wish I always remembered to do this, but I have learned to underexpose the image more than I would normally think to when photographing birds with a very dominant and vibrant colour like this (cardinals, gold finch, etc.) to maintain detail in all channels.

All of the above are genuine nits on a very striking image that has a lot going for it and one that I would be delighted to have captured myself.

Registered on April 5, 2011, 223 Posts, 1193 Comments

Comment posted by Kurt Bowman on August 4, 2014 at 8:49 PM

I like the head tun and the pose in this one John. I agree with John L.'s points and think he has some good suggestions. Still nicely seen and thanks for sharing....especially nice to see a new species.

Registered on June 19, 2008, 1005 Posts, 8028 Comments

Comment posted by Ray Whitt on August 6, 2014 at 8:26 AM

Great pose and an excellent setting, nice catch.

Ray

Registered on May 27, 2011, 92 Posts, 2619 Comments

Comment posted by Dennis Plank on August 6, 2014 at 11:19 AM

Nice catch, Patrick. Hope this doesn't become another invasive, though it's quite a striking bird. Others have covered the technical issues in admirable detail.

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