Grosbeak Behavior

Gallery: AvianPosted June 8, 2016154 views5 comments

This looked to me like another courtship behavior from the Evening Grosbeaks that have been hanging around this summer. The perch was a fairly distant bird box mounting post and attached branch for perching and they picked the worst possible spot on it, but I'll take what they gave me. I did clone out the zip ties that attach the perch to the post. I wish I'd had more dof, but I'd started out with pretty low light that morning and hadn't stopped down at this time.

7DII, Sigma 150-600 C @ 374 mm, Wimberley sidekick on Z1 ballhead on RRS legs, f/6.3, 1/400, iso 1250, aperture priority, pattern metering, -2/3 EV to try keeping the white wing bars from blowing out. Processed in LR5 & CS6. Cropped to 5.1 MP before resizing to get rid of a bunch of ugly bg. Taken June 5th at 6:04 AM.

Your comments and criticisms are always appreciated.

Thanks,

Comments

5 comments

Comment posted by Steve Thompson on June 8, 2016 at 8:39 PM

It looks like you made the best with what you had Dennis. It is a neat behavioral capture just too bad about the branch obstruction. Great colors and background and it shows the ritual well. Cool shot!

Registered on August 7, 2014, 125 Posts, 2319 Comments

Comment posted by Max Waugh on June 9, 2016 at 9:40 AM

Dennis, this is quite the splash of color. Obviously, we can only work with what the subject gives us, so I understand your frustration with the angle. In this case, I think I would force myself to try to focus the attention on the shape of the two subjects--spread wings, tail, yellow rump and head of the female--by cropping tighter. In a more "traditional" pose from a left-facing subject I would leave the empty space at left and top like this, but I almost feel the combined shape of the courting pair becomes a graphic element that serves as the center of attention here.

Max

Registered on September 26, 2008, 428 Posts, 2329 Comments

Comment posted by David Schoen on June 9, 2016 at 1:49 PM

Photographing more than one bird is not an easy task. You've done a good job here keeping everything in focus and tack sharp especially through all the movement. And the lighting is very nice and warm.

Registered on November 6, 2006, 1213 Posts, 4587 Comments

Comment posted by John Tobias on June 10, 2016 at 3:52 PM

Good action capture! I like the look on the rear most bird. Thanks for sharing.

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

Comment posted by May Haga on June 17, 2016 at 8:07 PM

Very interesting action Dennis. Well captured.
May

Registered on February 22, 2007, 714 Posts, 8470 Comments