Summer Tanager

Gallery: AvianPosted June 12, 2011137 views6 comments

This was shot in the camp ground in Zion National Park. I know the image is kind of busy and the background a little bright, but you cannot always control where the birds will land or what time of day they will come. If it was a perfect world or I set up my own circumstances everything would work for a perfect image. I would appreciate your input on whether this works at all. Thanks for your comments.

Canon 30D
Sigma 70-300
Aperture Priority
Shutter 1/1000
Aperture f6.7
ISO 800
300mm

Comments

6 comments

Comment posted by Ryan Marshik on June 12, 2011 at 6:20 PM

The contrast between the dark branches, and the stunning Summer Tanager works for me. Great shot!

Registered on February 1, 2011, 10 Posts, 103 Comments

Comment posted by Nancy Lea Sandy on June 12, 2011 at 7:27 PM

Works for me. He stands out great against the bg and the intense color keeps my eyes focused on him. Very nice

Registered on January 24, 2011, 576 Posts, 6942 Comments

Comment posted by Charlie Baugh on June 12, 2011 at 7:57 PM

Jim has the spirit you deserve for this one. It is a beautiful bird well documented and in so natural a setting. I don't want you to offer me more. This image is nature personified.

Registered on April 18, 2011, 329 Posts, 1985 Comments

Comment posted by Charlie VanTassel on June 12, 2011 at 8:33 PM

I like the pose and the surroundings. To me it looks like the overall photo was dark, so you selected the bird and brought up the exposure on the bird only. I can see an artifact around the bird from the selection. I would like to see the whole scene lightened instead without selecting out the bird. A little more detail in the branches would be nice and you'd get rid of the selection artifact.

Registered on October 18, 2006, 644 Posts, 4801 Comments

Comment posted by Ashley Vincent on June 12, 2011 at 11:01 PM

The twigs and branches don't bother me at all Richard, and I really like the contrast between the striking red of the Tanger and it's surroundings, although I also agree that lightening up the whole image would probably work better still.

Although this might not be the case, the picture looks to me as though you've applied noise reduction (NR), which I can well imagine it needed, however, if you did apply NR, my guess is that you worked it uniformly over the whole image, which would explain why there's very little sharpness and detail in the Tanger to be seen now in the larger version.

If this were mine, I would make a careful selection of the bird, inverse, then only apply NR to the background. Having done that, I'd invert the selection again and apply sharpening to the subject.

Registered on March 1, 2011, 154 Posts, 2083 Comments

Comment posted by David Sparks on June 14, 2011 at 1:12 PM

Beautiful bird. Branches do not bother me. The suggestions of Charlie and Ashley are good ones to try. It's worth spending time on the shot because of the nice pose and catch light you have captured.

Registered on May 26, 2007, 290 Posts, 4270 Comments