Blackbirds

I truly had this shot in mind and after a day of trying had nothing much to show for it. Went again in the Forest yesterday and got it second frame of the day. Justice prevailed! The low level angle hid the food from view but I still got the feet in as you can see. Taken just before the sun hit them and started to melt all the snow. Amazing how hard it is to get both birds in focus.

Canon 5d2, 600mm at F5.6, 1/500th at ASA 800. +1 EV. Cropped 20% off left, and 10% off top. Some highlight (snow) adjustment and added some vibrance, brightness and sharpening, otherwise much as from camera.

Dave

Nah you only got the feet of one of the birds

I am sure the detail is there on the full rez file, the blacks are starting to block up, more than likely due to the compression and has the bird without its feet showing got an eye shaped mark on its wing?

An excellent image with lots of action....

(as an aside I would use a much simpler font for your sig line on the image...)

Hi Phil, you're right about the blacks. I wanted to ask how to keep the shadow detail when jpegging - my PS skills are lacking a bit. The eye mark is a snowflake thing in front of the wing - I may clone it out (shock horror).

Dave

Hi David,

You could try a colour range selection, then adjust just the blacks in Shadow/Highlight, this is always a problem where jpeg compression throws away information, happens with whites as well

"I may clone it out (shock horror)" LoL

Phil

A great action capture Dave.
Robert

I thin Phil have covered the techs but full kudos on the capture of behaviour. Nice work..

Brett

beautiful shot David, the poses are wonderful and light shining through the wings is fabulous , can't stop looking at this

Great shot , thats what they do and you have frozen it at just the right moment.
Phil , could you give a bit more detail on" You could try a colour range selection, then adjust just the blacks in Shadow/Highlight". Thanks , Bob.

that's an excellent shot and one I tried to capture the other day in my garden. Unfortunately my efforts failed miserably, partly due to poor light and slow shutter speeds. You've captured the moment very well.

Matt

Hope you Don't mind David, I downloaded your image and tried to get the balcks showing detail, obviously I had to work with a file that had already lost the detail but I hope you get the gist of the method used.. also in answer to Bobs question.

In Photoshop go to Select> Colour range, click the eyedropper on the blacks, adjust the fuzziness slider untill just the part of the image you want selected shows as white/light grey in the little thumbnail.

Next go to Shadow/highlight and adjust the shadow slider untill the detail is showing, not too much mind as it can make the image a little funky, also I just used a little history brush to on the wings to restore them to the same as the original.

It will work much better on the full rez file if done just before resizing and jpeging...

HTH

Thanks Phil , I will take a new look at a few jackdaw and crow pix.

Bob.

Amazing shot, really well captured. A great bit of behaviour!

I liked the first version, but I think Phil has really improved it. A great piece of action caught well.

David

Great action and something I also tried, and failed, to capture at the weekend. Thanks also to Phil for the comments.

Dave

Many thanks Phil - never knew about colour range before. The jpeg had been compressed a lot in this post, to about 50% (I have limited space on my website now), but your tuition is spot on and it now looks like the tiff. I've put up my attempt at correcting the problem on my website now (showcase), so thanks again.

Dave

When I first saw this I thought “What a really cracking shot”, and as I was scrolling down I saw PhilH’s post so I rewrote this.

The original is as I say a cracking shot, but by adding detail in the blacks as Phil shows, does lift it to another level.

Excellent, just excellent, exceptionally well captured.

A cracking shot!

Simon

David,

A lovely shot - nicely previsualised.

One further processing tip - leave adding your signature until after you've sharpened the image, that way it stays clear.

Well I think that is just a fantastic wildife shot. Phil has covered the processing flaws, but the capture itself is outstanding IMO.
Eric

Agree completely with Eric - great shot to capture in the first place and the value of the forum shows again with getting the most from it (as a jpeg) in processing. Thanks to all for sharing

Great shot Dave, didn't understand a word about the processing from the others but do agree that the second shot is nice as well. prefer the original tho.

Brian

Fantastic action shot, Dave, and useful processing info from Phil (is this feature available in Elements, or just the full version?)

Greg

I think this is a super shot, well done

I prefer the original, I think markII looks unnatural with all the blacks being turned into greys. They are afterall, blackbirds

Like the first and like the action complete with disturbed snow.
Perseverance paid off.

Major.

Great bit of action caught there! I think a slight reworking of the original will produce some excellent results and improve on an already fine image

Cracking shot, great timing.

Very very good doctor Dave.

Danny

This one is a nice capture - really really like this. Not sure about the colours in the blacks on the second image - there seems to be a slight green tint. Fantastic though... Ian