Swan Goose headshot

[Overread]

Well despite the rather boring background I like the shot I got here - even in the birght sunlight - though I also had to do a curves edit to get more of the eye showing (an preset curves setting I don't know enough yet to control the sliders manually)

Taken with canon 400D and sigma 70-300mm f4-5.6 DG macro and tripod

At:f16, ISO 200, 1/100sec
link to larger: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3469/...f89be92e_o.jpg

Though I was at f16 which is rather low for such a shot (I was doing macro flowers and forgot to change it) I think it has worked well in this case as the bird was not that far away from me. The only big problem that I can see is the nettle in the background - even a wider aperture would not have blured this out enough I think

anyone else got any thoughts?

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[Overread]

bump (forgot I even posted this up)

[kundalini]

It may be worth an attempt to clone out the nettle. Apart from that, I think you have a nice shot here. Well... then there's that thing on the right. Hmmm

[LaFoto]

The eye is now perfect!
I love it when the sun shines right "through" the eye of just about anyone who has eyes, and lights them up from inside.

The white feathers (bottom of photo) are on the brink of being blown ... as much as the whole photo FEELS like it was on the brink of being overexposed (to me, who I know next to nothing about correct exposure, sorry about that), but it is still "just there".

To my mind, a mild cropping might help it some, so the darker brown thing at the top and the dark grey thing on the right could be made less conspicuous... ?

[tirediron]

Auto exposure, Aperture-priority AE, 1/100 sec, f/16, ISO 200

There's your problem right there; for whatever reason, your camera's meter was fooled, and you're just about 1 full stop over-exposed (assuming that you were shooting in bright sunlight as the shadows seem to indicate). This is why it's always a good idea to compare your camera's recommendation for exposure to the daylight exposure rule.

I'd say drop the exposure a little and do the cloning Kundalini suggested and you'll have a great image!

[Overread]

ahem - I think this might be time to put understanding exposure in the basket rather than the amazon wish list

Though I have gone back to the shot and I think the error came because whilst it was bright light, the light was not behind me and it was casting dark shadows over the bird and hiding the eye, so I stopped using -1 exposure compensation and reverted to normal settings to try and get the details back in the eye - hoping that the whites would not blow out and I would be able to capture the whole eye details - as I can recover from blown out whites better than trying to recover from details that simply are not in the shot to find.
Though I agree looking at this shot with fresh eyes I will try to lower the brightness and get the whites under control - as well as play around with cloning
Thanks for the advice all - expect results soonish