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scottcolbath

Late entry here.

What I like about the pic is that the humming bird's wings are completely at its side. Typically we see the birds with the wings spread. Talk about timing.



Here's the original:



I cropped and brightened it up a little. Added a little sharpness. I'm not thrilled with this pic.

I feel that the background is too bright. I don't think the bird could be any sharper, but it could have been better illuminated to bring out the colors.

How say you?

Thanks,
Scott

jjbong

scottcolbath wrote:

Late entry here.

What I like about the pic is that the humming bird's wings are completely at its side. Typically we see the birds with the wings spread. Talk about timing.

I don't think the bird could be any sharper, but it could have been better illuminated to bring out the colors.

Nice shot. And, as you say, when shooting animals, especially fast ones, timing is everything.

Several recent threads could be useful to you here. One is (oddly) on Black and White conversion (with a sticky at the top of the forum):

[thread]116682[/thread]

Getting a decent B&W version and putting it on a layer above the color image in Luminosity mode (I assume you have Photoshop) will indeed bring out more detail in the bird (make it somewhat sharper).



Adjusting the background to get the effect you want is the subject of another thread, where Pathfinder illustrates how to isolate an area using Photoshop tools (PS3 or later) fairly quickly:

[thread]116223[/thread]

again, assuming you have Photoshop.

Getting the bird's colors to pop more is yet another issue. I think some simple curves in LAB (or the equivalent with channel blending) would help here.

[thread]18308[/thread]

Hope this helps.

scottcolbath

Great info. Thanks. I have CS2, but an very new to using it.

BTW, I have the ability to hang a background if needed. What color would work the best?

S.C.