Black Phoebe under harsh lighting (noon)

[Teddy Regpala]

I'll bite ... ;D

From my latest lunch break sortie (last week).

Nikon D300, AFS 300mm f/4, 1.4 TC, 420mm, 1/500s, f/8, ISO 200, handheld. Unprocessed jpeg, converted using ViewNX.


Cropped image, adjusted white balance (I think, can't remember), levels, and picture controls, that's it. Processed using Capture NX2, and resized and added label in CS4.


A black and white bird captured at high noon. How can I improve this image?
- change cropping?
- will adjustments in contrast and saturation help?
- does it need more sharpening?
- should I clone the foreground ?

Any criticism will be appreciated.

Thanks.

*edit*
Aaargh. It seems the unprocessed one looks better.
Just like to add, the image was captured using Adobe RGB colorspace, and converted to sRGB during conversion to jpg.

[Romy Ocon]

Yehey.... congrats Ted on being the first customer of the Critique Corner! ;D



On the capture:

1. Nice exposure job given the harsh light, and considering that a bird with contrasting plumage is best photographed under overcast light. The shadow and HL details are intact and can be massaged a bit given the low ISO used.

2. In an ideal world, the stalk below the bird shouldn't be there..... I'd have moved a little to the left to get the stalk clear of the bird's tail, and make the job of cloning it out much easier.

3. A slight head turn might make the catchlight disappear, so I'd rather have this head position and the lively eye.


Cropping and PP Work:

1. Personally speaking, the offending stalk occupies too much of the frame that I'd hesitate cloning it out. It's not too hard to do in PS because of the plain BG and the portion of the tail to be reconstructed is very small, but I'd feel the change is too big for my comfort.

2. Cloning out is a matter of personal choice though, and if you feel ok in cloning it out, your second photo is a good composition..... just slash a bit off the sides to make a 2:3 aspect ratio, or at worst 3:4 (I prefer 2:3).

3. Considering that I'm hesitant to clean up the stalk, I'd wish its end to be visible in the frame for better balance. Thus, I'll choose not to crop at all and present the photo in both web and print as an uncropped full frame (and perhaps brag about not having to throw away any pixel ;D).

4. If working from NEF, I'd push the shadows some more and pull the highlights a hair, then perhaps boost the brightness, contrast and saturation a bit (colors look flattish on my LCD). The sharpening of the resized FF is good enough, though perhaps we can add a tad more of small radius USM to satisfy the peepers. ;D

Here's a quickie adjustment on the posted jpeg, the slight halo around the bird will not be there if I can work from NEF:

[Teddy Regpala]

Woohoo. Thanks mastah!

I took several bursts, and this pose (actually 2 frames) is the only one that's sharp AND acceptable (as far as pose is concerned).
Like what you said, others don't have catchlight and some are looking straight to me, etc.

Actually I'm stalking another bird when this bird just perched on the tree next to me. So I didn't move a step. If I only paid more attention, I could have avoided the foreground a bit.

After comparing the images, I realized how bad I am at PP. Hehehe.
Anyway, I'm sending you a PM for the url of the NEF.

Thanks Romy.

[Romy Ocon]

Ok, this one was converted and processed from NEF. The framing was from a 3600x2400 crop, so it can easily print up to 20"x30" if one wishes so.

I used the as shot WB, cloned out the offending leaves, then did a quick reconstruction of the tail using donor pixels from other tail feathers. I included the bunch of leaves at the upper right to make the composition less bland and to backstop/frame the rear of the bird.

BTW, I just demo'ed the technique here, but if this were my photo, I wouldn't do such drastic a cloning. ;D

One thing to remember in web display is to avoid posting a photo with a larger than lifesize subject - otherwise the fine feather detail will appear coarser because these are larger than in real life. Web photos are meant to be seen up close, so lifesize should be the largest posting. For prints, when the viewer is sometimes at a distance, larger than lifesize is more acceptable.

[Teddy Regpala]

Jun 5, 2009 6:52:24 GMT Romy Ocon said:

Ok, this one was converted and processed from NEF. The framing was from a 3600x2400 crop, so it can easily print up to 20"x30" if one wishes so.

I used the as shot WB, cloned out the offending leaves, then did a quick reconstruction of the tail using donor pixels from other tail feathers. I included the bunch of leaves at the upper right to make the composition less bland and to backstop/frame the rear of the bird.

BTW, I just demo'ed the technique here, but if this were my photo, I wouldn't do such drastic a cloning. ;D

One thing to remember in web display is to avoid posting a photo with a larger than lifesize subject - otherwise the fine feather detail will appear coarser because these are larger than in real life. Web photos are meant to be seen up close, so lifesize should be the largest posting. For prints, when the viewer is sometimes at a distance, larger than lifesize is more acceptable.

Before anything else, thanks a lot again mastah for showing us how you attacked this problem photo.

I apologize for the late response, been very busy recently.

I have one more question though, how do I determine "larger than life" image? Depending on the monitor, an image can be displayed differently. For example, an 800x600 image will look bigger on one monitor than another.
Or should I just go with the best guestimate I can ? Just wondering if there's some rule of thumb I can go by.

Thanks.

[Romy Ocon]

Most current displays (LCD or the odd CRT) are of 72 to 96 dpi resolution, hence it's quite simple to have an estimate of the size of the bird in the screen.

The smaller dpi (72) will yield a larger dimension on the screen, given the same photo dimensions, hence you can adopt that as the standard. For example, a 720-pixel long bird will look as 10" in 72 dpi screens and 7.5" in 96 dpi screens.

Since data about total bird length is readily available, you can quickly come out with a good presentation size. A 6-inch long Common Kingfisher should not be presented much longer than 432 pixels (6 inches x 72 dots/inch). At this pixel length, the bird will appear exactly 6" long in 72 dpi screens, and 4.5 inches long in 96 dpi screens.