A Study in Ruddy

Birder

Despite the blustery wind and first wintry weekend we've seen here in NY, I spent some time in Jamaica Bay NWR yesterday looking for an Eared Grebe (found), Eurasian Widgeon (also found) and a Barrow's Goldeneye (not seen). Along the way I had an opportunity to photograph some of the many Ruddy Ducks floating in the East Pond. Below are some of my selected shots, given the challenging shooting conditions including flat, dull lighting I thought it would be a good opportunity to work on my technique. Thank you in advance for any C&C, I am interested in any thoughts you might have including composition, post processing including colors, tonality, etc.

All photos were shot with:
Canon 7D
EF 70-200 f/2.8L & 1.4x Extender II
ISO 400
1/1000 f/5.6
RAW
Handheld
No flash

Given the Ruddy Duck's dark forehead, I reduced contrast here to try to make the eye pop a little more - I always try to catch some light in the eye (not always the easiest in flat lighting).


Here I added a layer with auto tone and blended it with the original to try to find some tonal balance


No autotone


Particularly interested in composition thoughts here


And here (is the background duck distracting or does it add dimentionality?)

deb22

Second shot is great!! I think the duck in the bg is very distracting.

Birder

Yep, have to agree on the duck in the BG. Was having trouble making the crop work without getting it in there. Thanks for the comments!.

D90mark

nice set, very nice shot all the same. I seem to excel at capturing oof birds in the bg. It can make for a difficult crop.

Allen

I'm totally not a fan of the main subject off to the edge unless it's more of a scene showing habitat.
Great shots of the Ruddy though.

Swimming birds with their wake are hard to show, I like to get in much of the wake showing the
action. But this puts the bird on the wrong side of center. Maybe not that bad as the wake is
is a major aspect of the photo also. Any thoughts on this?

Birder

Allen,

Interesting point on the wake - perhaps if the water were perfectly calm so that the wake was more dramatic a crop showing more wake would make sense? Otherwise, as you mention, it seems that the bird is swimming out of the picture. I have traditionally had birds more centered in my photographs, but I have received quite a bit of commentary suggesting to offset to make a more compelling composition. How would you crop these photos? Thanks again for the comments.

Harryb

First I would try to get those eyes to stand out more. On the wake its good to get in but then IMO you want your subject in the center third of the frame with the wake on the left or right third. I woud have move the subject a tad more ot the left on the first three captures. Unless your subject is moving towards the opposite corner your want to center them more as oppsoed to having them in the bottom third of the frame.

Birder

Thanks Harry, any suggestions on PP techniques to help get those eyes to pop? I partly chose this one due to the difficulty of the subject (you couldn't really see the eyes at all in the original), but couldn't get it much further. Perhaps the only way here would be to have better lighting in the field?