Nuthatch+Repost

Nice detail on the bird, especially for ISO 1600 and NR. There are some processing artifacts showing up in the brightest part of the tree stump in the URHC that are pretty distracting to me. Otherwise, great for the conditions.

Steve, you got a nice pose on this nuthatch. Nice to see you got a brighter day--only ISO 1600! Good detail on the bird. Like Ron says, those blobs in the upper right are odd--I'd try to tone down the inside of the stump.

Thank you for your close inspection of this image, Ron. That bright tree stump top really resisted correction. Surgery now looks like the best bet. The image is still a respectable 10 MP. Here it is!
P.S.: Brian, I just saw your comment. How about exporting some of that nice Arizona sunlight!

The stumpectomy looks like a success, it also helps the composition I think. Nice nuthatch photo!

Real nice . Love the position and the repost works for me as well

Congrats on getting a nice image of this species Steve, I like the comp better in the repost but still find the bird a little centered in the image.

good job with the repost, Steve. don't know if I can send any sunshine your way, but I'll try. Arizona is always waiting if you need a winter break though.

Excellent, Steve. The repost did the trick. I am curious as to whether the odd blobs were part of the original image form the camera or if they showed up in processing.

I especially like the pose of this nuthatch Steve. I prefer the repost for obvious reasons.

Thank you all very much for your assessments of this image. Dennis' question about the origin of the blobs made me think that perhaps some of you would like to see the original, unprocessed image. So, here it is.
Note that the major blob was evident from the beginning but my attempt to lower the exposure (using Viveza) made it and the others more obvious. Later I discovered that no matter what I did to lower exposure, that strange texture within the tree stump looked even stranger after correction....especially I think because I knew that I had made a correction! So, cropping was the best solution in the end.
Also, try comparing this original with the first posting. You can see that post processing improved this image but the changes are pretty subtle. Without the post processing I think most of you would have termed the image slightly noisy and slightly soft.
It's interesting that only Nate mentioned that the bird was centered. In this situation there was not much flexibility. I managed to off-center the eye of the bird but the bird's center of gravity looks pretty centered all right. Let's concentrate on the eye!
P.S.: Brian, I'd love to see Arizona. Maybe someday.....

Thank you for your comment, Cindy. The essential reason for the high iso is to avoid motion blur, not so much from my motion (this is a hand held shot) but more from the bird's motion. This little guy was very active. I was happy that the shot turned out so sharp at 1/640 s with the 400 mm lens. I know that with enough shots at a lower iso (and longer exposure time) I would have a chance at catching him when he paused. However, I much prefer the high iso approach if the image quality is good.