Good photo -- Great photo?

[Vytalis]

Any pointers welcome - this is a shot I got from a boat last week in Victoria, BC. It pales into insignificance with some on here, but it is the best I've got so want to make it look better with post production. Any tips on how I can do this? I've posted the original jpg straight from the camera.


Eagle 2 by Vytalis, on Flickr

Many thanks

[mcflurry]

Did you shoot the original in raw?
If so, then plenty of "tweaking" can done with Raw Therapee (free) or Lightroom (not free)

[Vytalis]

mcflurry said:

Did you shoot the original in raw?
If so, then plenty of "tweaking" can done with Raw Therapee (free) or Lightroom (not free)

Sadly not

[GetCarter]

Needs a BIG crop IMHO. Subject should be much bigger.

[Vytalis]

Yeah, I can do the crop without a problem but I'd rather show you the original in case any other changes need to be made first.

For info, it was taken from a 75-300mm Canon lens (nothing fancy like the L versions) at 300mm from a 450d

[Speed addicted]

I was using the same lens to take photos of similar birds, also from a boat. Did you find it quite slow to focus and really frustrating?

For the photo the big crop is the way forward, then tweak the levels to try to get rid of the coulered fringer around the wings (CA?).

[Vytalis]

Yeah, it wasn't great light out there either and the AF seemed to hunt all over the place. The OH and I are having a running battle about prime vs zoom which she is winning at the moment, otherwise I'd be blowing large amounts of cash on expensive kit (not that it'll help much tbh).

[Speed addicted]

I switched the focus to track the birds, even then I had loads of pictures of trees that were really sharp with blurred birds in front of them!

Mine is getting upgraded soon. I tend to go with making sure it can't possibly be the kits fault before blaming myself!

[Simpo Two]

One of the times when 'closest subject focus', if you have it in the toybox, might be an answer together with AF tracking. It's a test of the AF system for sure, and one where more 'pro' bodies will do better.

[GetCarter]

Vytalis said:

Yeah, I can do the crop without a problem but I'd rather show you the original in case any other changes need to be made first.

We all have different workflows, but always the first thing I do is crop (If needed). I'd never think of working on an image until I'm happy with the composition - which is by far the most important thing IMHO. If you are altering stuff and THEN cropping... the stuff you've altered may not work.

As I say... just my way of working.

[nick francis]

I downloaded the best image from Flickr but it was just 1024 x 638 and just 72 ppi, this was i think the highest res Flickr allowed but sadly its nowhere near enough information for a decent development.

Keep at it , birds in flight are probably some of the more challenging images to crack, Ai servo, high ISO and ultra fast shutter speed help

[RobDickinson]

It looks (at a glance) reasonably well metered for the bird, sky looks a total loss, crop in , clean up and sharpen, see how it goes?

[Vytalis]

nick francis said:

Keep at it , birds in flight are probably some of the more challenging images to crack, Ai servo, high ISO and ultra fast shutter speed help

I'm going to read that as: "A 7D and some expensive glass would be a very good investment."

[RobDickinson]

Vytalis said:

I'm going to read that as: "A 7D and some expensive glass would be a very good investment."

It would BUT IMO (having a 7d and expensive glass) theres an awfull lot of technique that cant be replaced by gear, and you can learn that with any kit.

[LongQ]

RobDickinson said:

Vytalis said:

I'm going to read that as: "A 7D and some expensive glass would be a very good investment."

It would BUT IMO (having a 7d and expensive glass) theres an awfull lot of technique that cant be replaced by gear, and you can learn that with any kit.

Yep. And also you have to be quite clear on a personal level what is and what is not a good investment.

At today's list prices (to set a comparison point) if you were to set out to replicate the sort of kit levels some of the 'recognised' experts in their fields (say bird shooters) use and buying new, you would probably need the best part of £20k to start off and double that to be serious about it. Unless you are doing it with an eye for a commercial market it seems like rather a lot of investment and effort to capture some snaps for an album. It's expennsive enough playing around in the lower divisions with motor sport stuff but the wildlife people tend to go to another level!

[RobDickinson]

1DIV and a 600f4 + 1.4tc would do it, and a good tripod, wimberly head, camo wrap, bag, memory etc

No idea how people manage to shoot BIF with 1200mm (600f4+2.0tc) I can barely find the things at 400mm.

[LongQ]

Vytalis said:

mcflurry said:

Did you shoot the original in raw?
If so, then plenty of "tweaking" can done with Raw Therapee (free) or Lightroom (not free)

Sadly not

Is the jpg created as Large/Fine?

If so it may take some processing. View at around 1:1 and see if it looks passably sharp - how sharp will give some idea about how big the central image can go and therefore how much cropping it will stand based on the size of output you want. If you are sticking it onto facebook as a thumbnail you can murder it. If you want an A3 print to view at reading distance showing details of the individual feathers and what it at for breakfast ... maybe not.

A couple of interesting programs that seem to allow a lot of latitude with jpg files are Capture One (from Phase One) and LightZone (from Light Crafts) both of which are available in fully functional Trial form. They are photo editors not graphics systems so tend to work specifically for the needs of photos. Capture One has some pretty good built-in processing for the sort of CA/purple fringing that I think I see at the point of feather/sky interface. Pretty much makes it disappear with little or no effort required at all. I suspect some other programs may be able to do the same these days as new versions are released.

[Vytalis]

Thank you all for your comments - definitely given me something to work on. Sadly, as you've probably gathered I was being flippant about the 7d so I'll just have to sort my technique out instead.