Short Eared owl

beautiful soft lighting on this image and I love the bright yellow eyes. Details look a touch soft and judging by the lack of light I'm guessing the ISO was pretty high?

Excellent image. The eyes is very sharp, including the catch light. That is by far the most important detail!

Thanks Guys ,Luke think you might have a point re the sharping, have a bit of a thing about getting my birds over sharp, I will repost with some sharping.
Appreciated Keith.

I agree with the sharpening comments Keith, but I have to say I LOVE the soft light in this and the mood it sets. Well done.

Hi Keith, central placement works well and as noted earlier, cool light, like the head on look engaging with the viewer. Personally I might have gone for a more 'rectangular' format, but square is good.

To me it looks a wee bit dark, I might just check the Shadows/Blacks based on the larger version, I might even back off on the green in Saturation, looks a bit heavy, but your call.

TFS
Steve

Hi Keith,

Looks pretty good and I concur with the other viewers about a tad more sharpening for some of the details. Th eyes and catchlight are very nice................................Jim

Lovely image Keith. I too like the soft light on the bird but I agree with Steve the darks could be brought up just a tad.

Here is a slightly sharpened version, Thanks for your helpful comments, Steve I know what you are saying and agree but was trying to keep the darkish moody look of when the shot was taken, arty I know.
Luke the iso was 500.

Thanks all ,Keith

I like the mood of this image very much. Lovely soft light. Nicely captured.

It has a painterly feel. Love it.

Keith,
What a wonderful shot! There is a lot to like about it. Where did you take it, what is the back story and and when did you take it? Where are you from? Love the post, the straight on look and the vivid background.

Nice light, but limits your options of course. That said, I like the overall atmosphere and the clear difference on the eye that was catching the light (with the small pupil) and the eye in the shadow (with a much larger pupil). Love it ! Hans

Thanks to you all much appreciated, really pleased that you liked the moody feel that I tried to capture.
Patrick have been a bit house bound for a while "hip replacement" ,only good thing it gave me some time to sort out the mass of images I have taken over the last few years, I live In Lincolnshire in the UK ,a few years back we had a some of these Owls over wintering with us, only down side was the fact the site was fenced with the type the bird is sitting on, unfortunately this part of Lincolnshire is very intensively farmed and this site went under the plough and is much like the rest of Lincolnshire .
On the positive side I did find many other images of these birds in different light and positions ,so the hip did have it's up side.
Thanks a lot, Keith.

I think the softness makes this photo. Soft background, soft feathers, soft lighting. Would like camera angle slightly to the right to catch some sun, Great job diluting dead branches in background.