Came across a couple of goldeneyes today. The male showed off with this back-bend along with a creaking noise. The female responded with an eider-like noise.
I just liked this shot and thought it was interesting behaviour.
A very well caught moment and as you say an intersting bit of behaviour to have captured.
A couple of things that would improve this fine shot further would be a little more sharpening (although this may look fine on an LCD screen,I'm still using a CRT here),and secondly perhaps just a couple of degrees anti-clockwise rotation would finish this one off nicely.
I find it difficult to make a final sharpening for images as small as 720 pixels wide - and as you mention, I'm using an LCD. However, I must confess that I am very conservative regarding sharpening because I know there are some very contrasty LCDs that will reproduce my images very harsh.
I'm happy with the orientation by the way. The reflection of the top of the beak is right beneath the beak itself - as it should be.
Cheers, Jens.
Posted by Paul Thomas on March 31, 2007 at 5:44 PM
I've seen Goldeneye doing their courtship behaviour on a number of occasions but they've never been close enough for me to photograph. Well done for capturing the moment. The bird could stand a bit more sharpening on my LCD monitor though.
Great behaviour makes for an interesting image, great colour in the water, for sharpening try at web size, try USM at 100/0.2/0 apply about 4 - 5 times fading to luminosity after each application, if it goes 'crunchy' you can back of by going to the history palatte...
Discussion
4 repliesI just liked this shot and thought it was interesting behaviour.
Cheers, Jens.
(Olympus E-1, 420mm, 1/1250 sec., f/4.0, ISO 100)
A couple of things that would improve this fine shot further would be a little more sharpening (although this may look fine on an LCD screen,I'm still using a CRT here),and secondly perhaps just a couple of degrees anti-clockwise rotation would finish this one off nicely.
I find it difficult to make a final sharpening for images as small as 720 pixels wide - and as you mention, I'm using an LCD. However, I must confess that I am very conservative regarding sharpening because I know there are some very contrasty LCDs that will reproduce my images very harsh.
I'm happy with the orientation by the way. The reflection of the top of the beak is right beneath the beak itself - as it should be.
Cheers, Jens.
Paul