caspian tern

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gordon_g

gordon_g

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Spent some time doing this last night, which one do you like better Number 1 or Number 2? and don't be afraid to add anything else you see fit.

Also why does this look so much sharper on my screen than uploaded here?

Number 1
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Gorden, just so you know I am afraid to critique your work, But I'll be brave and do it anyway.
The background I find very distracting or perhaps disturbing as it makes the image look dirty. The dark water area seems to just end with no horizon or anything out there. I guess I am missing a point of some kind of reference to the bird.
I like the angle to the subject and it looks like it is somewhat eye level, exposure for the bird looks good and whites not blown. Technically the bird looks great!

JMHO
 
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Promapper said:
Gorden, just so you know I am afraid to critique your work, But I'll be brave and do it anyway.
The background I find very distracting or perhaps disturbing as it makes the image look dirty. The dark water area seems to just end with no horizon or anything out there. I guess I am missing a point of some kind of reference to the bird.
I like the angle to the subject and it looks like it is somewhat eye level, exposure for the bird looks good and whites not blown. Technically the bird looks great!

JMHO
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No reason to be Afraid to critique... This was over a very large body of water and the entire body of water is filled with "stuff". you should see what I took out... in fact I will show you the original. As you can tell I had to take out the two black areas
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Gorden, lovey catch here.
I would :
crop so that the tern is slightly more to the right, off centre more.
great job on removing black lines
use NIK Viveza to fix overexposed whites on his shoulders and on the fish. Failing that, you clone in some plumage onto the white strips on a new layer, then you can fade the opacity to suit
I think your 1st image has lightened corners, I will reverse it and make the image overall darker and place a spotlight on the Caspian.
I would also use a tighter crop around the bird to loose a lot of the water.
You can separate the bird and BG, content aware fill BG hole where bird was, denoise and blur, change opacity to suit or use a mask to keep the top more blurred and the bottom less blurred.
Overall, I think you will get a stronger, more pleasing image.
Again, this is subjective.
 
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Thanks @Callie I will give these a try over the weekend Much appreciated... I was debating between white and the black inf the first place but now that you say it I agree with your assessment.
 
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I wonder if the black lines might contribute to the horizontal balance of the composition? Leave the black and take out the vertical brown ones? Just a thought.
 
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Kathy G said:
Gordon, this looks better. I would make the tern brighter. The vignette looks a bit dark, I always use a subtle vignette so that it is not really noticeable, but that is subjective.
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I've done a lot of Editing on this Photo... I need to get out and just take a better Photo now.. LOL. In all seriousness it's all been practice for my post anyway... Made a lot of progress in the last couple days just playing around trying different stuff. Will try your suggestions and repost though!
 
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gordon_g said:
I've done a lot of Editing on this Photo... I need to get out and just take a better Photo now.. LOL. In all seriousness it's all been practice for my post anyway... Made a lot of progress in the last couple days just playing around trying different stuff. Will try your suggestions and repost though!
Click to expand...
Yup, it’s all about learning and sometimes we have to say, yes, I have learned a lot but time to move on!
 
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Now you speak my language! :giggle: ;) The slight off-set of the tern, darker white shoulders and darker BG works much nicer, methinks! What really counts, is that you thought about the image, how to, what to, how much of. All Subjective and it must "speak" to you in the end.
 
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