Critique: My 2nd post - Birds in flight

[Raj_55555]

I received a lot of constructive feedback last time out, and have learned a few things since then. Posting the best of my birds in flight shots, please let me know how you would have made it better, both in camera and post processing. Please keep in mind that I use a point and shoot, shooting birds in flight can be a challenging task with the slow focusing..

Photo details: Canon sx50 point and shoot, both shot in manual mode, hand held, iso 250, shutter speed 1/1600, f5.4, harsh sunlight.
Post processing in LR 4.3. ( I rely on post processing a lot )

Feel free to ask any further information, here are the pics..

1. Battle Formations


2. Steven Seagull


P.S. yeah, I like to name my photographs..

 

[DLeeT]

Nice shots. BIF can be tough and frustrating, but also a lot of fun. Lee

 

[Raj_55555]

Nice shots. BIF can be tough and frustrating, but also a lot of fun. Lee

Thanks Dleet
Anyway you feel the images can be improved?

 

[DLeeT]

The shots look fine to me. I'll let others with more BIF experience than me offer suggestions.

One thing I did notice though: You're image attachment size is 1024 pixels wide and yet the file sizes are only 100+ KB. I'm no expert but that seems quite small -- my file size, and others, are usually around 900+/- KB with a pixel size of 1000 or so. I wonder what resolution you used. I think this may affect IQ when viewed larger? Perhaps others will jump in with better knowledge of such things. Lee

 

[Raj_55555]

The shots look fine to me. I'll let others with more BIF experience than me offer suggestions.

One thing I did notice though: You're image attachment size is 1024 pixels wide and yet the file sizes are only 100+ KB. I'm no expert but that seems quite small -- my file size, and others, are usually around 900+/- KB with a pixel size of 1000 or so. I wonder what resolution you used. I think this may affect IQ when viewed larger? Perhaps others will jump in with better knowledge of such things. Lee

Thanks DLeet .

File size is more dependent on the noise, and less on the dimensions of the image. I have done extensive noise reduction (shots are very noisy over 200 ISO in my camera), hence the small size of the image. A small experiment you can do in Photoshop or Lightroom to verify this is by adding/removing some noise before exporting the image and monitoring the file size. I found this out very recently, thought it might be worth sharing.

 

[Raj_55555]

I was really hoping someone experienced might help me improve by finding flaws in these shots. Bumping the thread. Any response will be appreciated.

 

[Aloicious]

pretty good! gull are great for BIF practice. what is it you've thrown at the one in post #2? breadcrumbs? I'd clone those out and crop some off the left of the frame.

blues in the sky look a little too boosted IMO (I'm on a crappy non calibrated monitor right now though),

some kind of halo can be seen around the birds in both images, looks like probably a dodge tool overlap onto the background or something similar, I'm not too familiar with LR, but if possible try masking and working with your layers to only apply any hand tooling like that to specific areas without overlap, alternatively (or in conjunction) you could work with curves or a universal or masked adjustment to raise the darks/mids.

the crop in #1 is good, #2 is better IMO in terms of bird pose, lighting, etc, but a crop adjustment would help it as mentioned above.

 

[jamesparker1250]

Maybe a little higher shutter speed . but beside that they look great.

 

[Raj_55555]

pretty good! gull are great for BIF practice. what is it you've thrown at the one in post #2? breadcrumbs? I'd clone those out and crop some off the left of the frame.

Actually those were some biscuits being thrown by some other people, I don't like to fiddle with the subject while shooting it. But if others are helping me out, why waste an opportunity?
I considered cloning out those pieces, would be easy enough. But thought it adds a story to the image, do you think it would look better without them?

blues in the sky look a little too boosted IMO (I'm on a crappy non calibrated monitor right now though)

I see what you mean, here's a different version of it. Any better?

some kind of halo can be seen around the birds in both images, looks like probably a dodge tool overlap onto the background or something similar, I'm not too familiar with LR, but if possible try masking and working with your layers to only apply any hand tooling like that to specific areas without overlap, alternatively (or in conjunction) you could work with curves or a universal or masked adjustment to raise the darks/mids.

I thought it wasn't noticeable, but that's clearly not the case. I tend to overdo my my editing to limit the flaws of my camera. As a matter of fact that would be my next thread, I'll be more careful.

It's sometime not possible to find your own flaws, your post helped a lot.

 

[Raj_55555]

Maybe a little higher shutter speed . but beside that they look great.

Thanks, I did switch the shutter speed to 1/2000 later on(that's the limit for my cam) . But couldn't produce any interesting image.

Right now I'm thinking of getting a Nikon D7000/D5200 + Nikkor 70-300 AFS VR lens. They'll give me a few more options.

 

[DLeeT]

Maybe a little higher shutter speed . but beside that they look great.

Thanks, I did switch the shutter speed to 1/2000 later on(that's the limit for my cam) . But couldn't produce any interesting image.

Right now I'm thinking of getting a Nikon D7000/D5200 + Nikkor 70-300 AFS VR lens. They'll give me a few more options.

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You might take a look at the new Tamron 150-600. It is generating a lot of interest among the BIF gang. Lee

 

[sk66]

IMO, your aperture is set too wide. It's probably at about max. That's not going to be the sharpest aperture and it's not going to give you the DOF you need to help with moving subjects.
As was noted, the processing is too much. Looks like shadow/highlight recovery issues to me.

 

[WesternGuy]

One problem that we all have when photographing BIFs, particularly from below as you have in the first image, is to get enough exposure to show details in the wing feathers. If this was my situation, shooting from below, I think I might have tried about somewhere between +2/3 to +1 1/3 exposure compensation (EC) to open up and try and get detail in the underside of the wings. Exactly what EC you end up with depends a lot on your camera and the lens you are using. I find I have to experiment a bit. You may slightly over expose the sky, but it is the detail in the bird that you are really going for and sometimes you can bring the sky back in post-processing. Hope this helps.

WesternGuy

 

[Raj_55555]

IMO, your aperture is set too wide. It's probably at about max. That's not going to be the sharpest aperture and it's not going to give you the DOF you need to help with moving subjects.
As was noted, the processing is too much. Looks like shadow/highlight recovery issues to me.

The smallest aperture allowed is f3.4, so not much I can do there unfortunately . .One of the downfalls of having a point and shoot..
I really need to look into my processing.. Thanks

You might take a look at the new Tamron 150-600. It is generating a lot of interest among the BIF gang. Lee

Amazing lens, maybe a bit out of my budget. But sure worth a double thought. Unfortunately, I just couldn't find any at the online stores in India. Maybe after a few months..

 

[Raj_55555]

One problem that we all have when photographing BIFs, particularly from below as you have in the first image, is to get enough exposure to show details in the wing feathers. If this was my situation, shooting from below, I think I might have tried about somewhere between +2/3 to +1 1/3 exposure compensation (EC) to open up and try and get detail in the underside of the wings. Exactly what EC you end up with depends a lot on your camera and the lens you are using. I find I have to experiment a bit. You may slightly over expose the sky, but it is the detail in the bird that you are really going for and sometimes you can bring the sky back in post-processing. Hope this helps.

WesternGuy

I had always thought the changing the EC, only changes the ISO, shutter speed and the aperture to increase/decrease the exposure.. Is that not so? I have never really used EC, time to get back to the basics I guess. You learn something new everyday, thanks