Magical merlin morning (warning: contains gore)

Hello all,

apologies for the gore in my post - that's nature I'm afraid.

Also apologies to those on the forum who've already heard my tale over the weekend (Hi Brett, Tony) and are probably heartily sick of it.

Whilst mooching around my local patch early on Saturday morning I flushed this merlin which flew across the golf course carrying her prey and landed on one of the fairways. Rather adventurously I decided to see if I could get close to her and started slowly belly-crawling along the fairway fully expecting the bird to fly off as soon as it saw me. To my amazement I managed to slowly crawl about 50-60 yards down the fairway, taking a detour round the green as I know how proud the greenskeepers are of their lovingly-manicured greens and how much they resent them being gouged up by knees, elbows and lens plates…, and managed to get within decent range of the merlin. She carried on feeding regardless with the occasional disdainful glance at me as in "what's this idiot doing?".

For my part, I was like a dog with two tails - such a privilege to be so close to such a beautiful bird - and also cursing myself for not having any spare memory cards on me! I was conscious of not getting too close in case I spooked the bird and she abandoned her prey (an unfortunate skylark, I think - RIP). In the end, after about 5 minutes of me lying in front of her a couple of the greenskeepers spooked her and she flew off carrying her breakfast with her for a bit of peace. Magical start to a weekend!

Details:
D90 plus 200-400 @400mm
f6.3
1/500 sec
0 ev
ISO 1250 - shame it was so gloomy
ACR, CS3, levels and sharpening
Cropped for composition - the 'mush' off the bottom (just in case Carl Marr is reading) and at the sides
Soaked from head to foot in the heavy dew/overnight rain
Big cheesy, smug grin


I'd be interested in any help/advice with how to deal with the noise - I've used NeatImage on a separate layer and a layer mask so that only the background has the noise reduction applied to it (none on the bird).

Thanks for reading,
Rob

Well done Rob. one I would love to get a crack at

Well I think this is cracking Rob, and a great story too. A real treat to get so close to a bird like this. It does seem a touch on the bright side on my monitor and perhaps a little too central (maybe less on the left and a bit more on the right where its looking). That aside, great stuff

Simon

Hi Rob,

Cracking shot, the noise doesn't look bad at this size, shame about the high ISO but you can't have it all. I agree with the two nits already mentioned by Simon.

Cheers,

Lewis.

Its a great picture (though a bit bright on my screen) of a truly memorable experience for you Rob so enjoy it and forget about the noise ! If you had been shooting film you would probably have had to change film, you probably would only had a 400 iso (max) fast film and you probably would not have got this picture. Are you happy with your shot? (I would be). If you are, enjoy it and don't worry about what is after all just a bi-product of such a high iso.

Robert.

A bit bright, as has already been pointed out, but I think you made the most of the opportunity. Sometimes you just have to tell yourself that the experience was great, and that the picture is a bonus. Most of us would be more than happy to settle for a shot like this.

David

Nits covered, a lovely image,great pose captured and a fine result for your hard work you put into this shot

Knowing the amount of time you put in to get your shots Rob this is just reward. The image is a tad harsh but easily rectified. Not too noisy at web resolution.
Well done!

Tony

Nits covered, it's not gore but nature, cruel at times perhaps. A superb image and a great study, like it very much.

Fran

I agree. Nature can APPEAR cruel, but rarely is, as most animals kill to eat and therefore survive! A good study.
Regards,
Paul.

A great shot Rob

looks fine to me but as mentioned a bit bright.

Well caught

Hi Rob,

Nice story and shot. As others have said a tad bright and you could afford to lop some off the LHS and put back some on the left. On the web version I can't really see much noise so the NI processing and masking seems to have done the trick. Getting a good print out of it might be more difficult but I'd still try. Not a species in my collection.

Thanks for all the feedback - I appreciate it. Sounds like I'll have to have a twiddle with my brightness knobs.

Robert - yes, I am very happy with the shot. My work colleagues have been thinking I must have won the lottery as I've had a bounce in my step all week

Cracking shot, I would be very happy with something like this!