Eagles against the Evergreens
pathfinder
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After I returned from Alaska last spring, I posted a thread of eagle images - a couple of which were in front of snowy mountain ranges. http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=253186
I had lot of other images of eagles in front of forested terrain, but found most of them not very pleasing as a background. I was wandering through my files the last few days, and I found a few images of eagles in front of forests that I am going to post, and see if viewers here agree with me that these are interesting images.
The first was captured with a 1DMk4 which was my preferred wildlife body in early 2012. This is very minimal crop show with aa 400 DO IS and a 1.4 TC, a combination I rarely use, but was that afternoon.
The second image was captured by a 7D with Canon 70-300 IS L lens which I used a lot in 2012.
I like this image because it displays the contortions eagles go through while in flight. If the background were more blurred, one might think the file was rotated incorrectly, but the trees in the background clearly show where vertical is.
I am eager to hear criticisms, and suggestions for improvement of these two images.
I had lot of other images of eagles in front of forested terrain, but found most of them not very pleasing as a background. I was wandering through my files the last few days, and I found a few images of eagles in front of forests that I am going to post, and see if viewers here agree with me that these are interesting images.
The first was captured with a 1DMk4 which was my preferred wildlife body in early 2012. This is very minimal crop show with aa 400 DO IS and a 1.4 TC, a combination I rarely use, but was that afternoon.
The second image was captured by a 7D with Canon 70-300 IS L lens which I used a lot in 2012.
I like this image because it displays the contortions eagles go through while in flight. If the background were more blurred, one might think the file was rotated incorrectly, but the trees in the background clearly show where vertical is.
I am eager to hear criticisms, and suggestions for improvement of these two images.
Pathfinder - www.pathfinder.smugmug.com
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
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I'd agree - with respect to the main subjects - but I wonder about other aspects, as I suspect you do - because of your comments.
To my eyes (and level of pp skills
I'm not a great fan of 'spotty and stripey' backgrounds as in #1 - I'll accept them (grudgingly) in my own daubs if there's something special going on, but much prefer others - like your #2 pic - that are in harmony with the subject, offer some texture etc, but don't 'pull the eye' to any great extent.
For this reason, together with how tight the subject is in frame, I have no useful suggestions.
For 2, there's some tweaking potential imo.
Easiest is a square or 4:3? crop, putting more breathing space in front of (than behind) the bird, but getting rid of the 2 light 'eye pulls' in top r of frame.
Second could be to put a lot of the bg that's behind the bird, in front of it,with the overlapping area also dumping the previously mentioned 'EPs'
This would allow regaining a 3:2 crop (if required) ...but would also highlight how tight the bird's lower tip is to frame bottom.
Using material in the orig. frame to again provide breathing space / canvas below this lower wing offers both other LS and portrait crop potential imo.
I acknowledge that all of this has been said with the std maxim re more breathing space in direction of travel in mind ... and that rules are meant to be broken etc ...
Obviously, if you have other frames with similar background material, from which you can nick areas ...even better ... but I think there's just about enough without.
I have no idea how these were shot, but using a support, rather than HH, helps (me,anyway) to get successive frames suitable for pano stitching (of bg) with moving subjects - but I'm sure this is already a 'known' for you
pp
Flickr
I'm not a fan of 'spotty and stripy backgrounds' either, but as you said, sometime one grudgingly accepts one. I think I am attracted to this frame because I know it is almost shot as framed - very minimal cropping, and that is not that easy for me, handheld at ~560mm ( 400 - 1.4 TC )
I prefer the second image too - I like the contortion the eagle is in to be able to see over its wing as it turns to the right .
The image had significantly more snow around the edges in the trees ( lighter eye grabbing bits, I think you call them ), which I already cropped out.
I do like they grey fog/mist diagonal through the frame behind the eagle, which I think helps set the bird out from the trees more.
Unfortunately I don't have other frames to pano or clone with this one and the eagle's right wingtip is right where it appears in the frame, so there is no easy way to get more background to the right or to the bottom of the frame.
I did try a square crop, but I favor what I posted, I think...even bearing in mind allowing room for the action to move in the frame as you mentioned... I don't think the eagle is really going to be moving to the right much longer, but just abut to make a quick turn back to the left by rotating around its right wing
I want to thank you for your comments, I think we are in general agreement about these two frames. I just thought they were interesting, because many of my images, shot in front of forest, of birds in flight don't seem to work well for me, but I thought these were worth considering - spotty stripy stuff notwithstanding.
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PP, I agree with you.
I just figured it is hard to find eagles and get them nice and sharp in full flight.....so not ideal comps or background but still nice.........
Always appreciate it when you do post....
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In the first image, there was nothing below the bird but a very blurred, out of focus dull grey water flow, which I had cropped out as it was already unattractive. I decided to try to clone the background into that area to have more breathing room below the eagle, and then decided what the heck, I'll clone in new bottom, Gaussian blur the background a bit more more to deal with Paul's "spotty and stripey comments ( which I agreed with ) as well, and darken the background just a touch more, and arrived here - a lot of work to select the bird first, but this is the result. Not sure if I really like it better than what I started with. I will be interested in your opinion if this is an improvement too.
For the second image I recropped it as a 4x5 framing from the post 1x2 framing. I kind of like the 1x2 framing for many of my images, but I agree, in this instance the 4x5 might be an improvement. The eagle was too close to the lower edge of my viewfinder in that shot - I was too slow with the shutter as the bird accelerated down toward the water. No changes in this second image other that the 4x5 cropping.
I am interested in your opinion Big Al - I find I rather miss the diagonal line of fog and trees in the image I originally posted, but the 4x5 is a nice focus on the eagle.
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I think it's quite easy to overdo bg blur in post and lose the subtle indications of texture that exist in a cam / lens defocused bg as taken. You'd need someone far cleverer than me with this stuff to say why or define said differences ... just a feeling from messing around with pix for a while.
It seems too 'clean' and now makes me think of Hollywood 'celebs' who've had several facelifts too many ... in my early days of messing with PS, I used to add noise in attempts to deal with this effect. I also used to blur particular parts of the bg (and fg) by different amounts and try to blend them together ... to avoid the 'sudden bg blur' effect that could otherwise be evident.
In one, the 3 almost square bg 'blocks' above the strip(e) are now even more prominent - because of the added canvas to the top of frame.
Think I prefer the shape of the original first pic as well as the more real bg - even taking previous comments into account - think I would've been tempted to add a tad of canvas to the top and 2 tads (old uk technical term ... it's half a yea
Second rework is sniffing round the edges of my previous comments / suggestions ... and similar to something I ended up with after a brief play when first posted.
However, I added canvas to the bottom of frame and got rid of the 'eye pull' in top R of frame -the lighter tree trunk? with horizontal bit and blob.
This is starting to encroach imo into questioning what the pic's all about, when it starts drifting away from an accurate visual memory of some event ... as you mentioned in a different thread when you said you wanted to have particular geographic features in frame etc.
In my case, going to the same venue, I'm not bothered / interested in the environment apart from how it can be used to form colours and textures for the pic.
pp
Flickr
I kind of expected some criticism for the degree of blur in the first image - I do agree that it is borderline too much, ( I think the lighter horizontal green-yellow line is just too hard to ignore ) but when I played with the degree of blur with the Gaussian blur tool, anything less just didn't seem right to my eye either - I did the blur layer on a background layer, and blended it with the existing background but it is what it is I think. You can only polish something so much, and if it was a dog to start with. Well, you get the idea. I'm sure.
I do like the 4x5 framing in the second image better than the original, too.
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I'm not sure on this one, as I'm not too fond of squarish crops on animal photography. However, as you say, the focus is now more on the bird. I'd maybe blur/clone out the highlighted landscape feature on the right.
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One pro, one con for number one, and one pro and one kind of con for two. I excluded myself since I am biased.
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Certainly do.
If I'd kept all mine, there'd be enough candidates to fill many boarding kennels + populate several Crufts shows.
pp
Flickr
I like the 2nd crop of #2, again the eagle stands out and I don't even see the background. I should be so fortunate as to capture a bird in flight, this well. In my book, you have succeeded in capturing these beautiful birds in flight.
Phil
Luck happens when preparation meets opportunity!
In absolute terms, maybe - but it also - imo - depends an awful lot on the type of image one's after and how one goes about getting it.
For a start, snapper has a choice of two basic approaches:
Wander around with gear, hope to find / see something interesting and take a pic or
Choose a location, stay put and hope that something happens.
Both have pros and cons, of course ... but with respect to controlling the background, then 2 (imo) offers better potential.
Pros offer ' w/life photo experiences' for paying punters by setting up hides in (hopefully) target rich environments with decent backgrounds - some of these have been taken to the max by building custom hides with fancy one way glass facing 'reflection pools' for low level water shots (google Bence Mate)
Whilst it could be argued that such setups are somewhat distant from a typical w/life encounter for the average (financially impoverished?) snapper, similar approaches can also be taken by anyone, imo.
In my particular case, I've scoped out my local venue to find suitable backgrounds for the type of shot that I'm after and built custom support gear to help me get said shots.
Viewpoint is paramount too, imo re background control, since - if one is after low level shots, over water (as I am) rather than the more typical 'high cam, looking down pov' then there is no other way of getting them other than being at the appropriate level.
Adding a Tc alters dof appearance, but its addition doesn't / can't alter the camera height relative to water level ... and this is almost always apparent in pics, even when there's only evidence of a horizon, rather than the horizon itself.
I obviously accept that this method / approach is unlikely to be of universal interest - but for the type of pic I'm after, it works (on a good day:) ) ... and, in general, I'd prefer a decent pic of a boring / common subject - preferably doing something interesting? than a boring ID shot of some apex predator that I'd had to travel half the world to see ... and not get the shot I was after ... maybe because local health and safety rules wouldn't let me get it
Ultimately, of course, any snapper has the final say re whether to upload / display his / her pic don't they?
pp
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Here's another eagle BIF in the rain - not perfectly crisp, but there was a bit of water in the air that morning, and it does have some of Paul's hated "stripey" background still.
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So, it's my fault that nature has provided features that render as 'stripey' in people's pics, eh?
Again, a decent shot of the main subject - although I wonder about what a front, rather than a rear quarter shot would have looked like - but, as you suggest, a ? re the bg.
To me, this isn't a 'proper' stripe ... as opposed to a 'strip' ... because only one transition edge is in the pic, as opposed to the first pic here.
It'd be good to see this pic with the water / land line a bit below - rather than through - the bird's wing and see what people views were of the two.
If this was the people forum and someone posted a couple of pics, one with a lamppost sticking out of a kid's head, and the other without ... I wonder which viewers would prefer?
As a bear of little brain, I tend to view this 'snapping' lark in a fairly simplistic manner ... if it's supposed to be about 'painting with light', then - in the same way that any artist / bodger using 'traditional' materials presumably doesn't put any paint on their canvas that they don't want to be there - then elements in a photo that the 'tog doesn't want there also constitute a problem / issue?
I like the muted / soft bg colours and definitely the rain in frame, btw ...
pp
Flickr
No, you are certainly not responsible for nature's features that may be rendered as "stripey" bands by an inattentive photographer. That inattentive photographer would be me.
I reviewed your comments and went back to the sequence of images preceding and following the image I posted - I found four images all taken within the same 1 second of time, and of the 4, the one I posted was much preferred over the other three, even though they did have no background lines passing through the bird as you suggested.
I generally agree that a kid without trees or telephone poles coming out of his head is strongly preferred - but if the kid is looking the other way, frowning with his eyes slammed shut, I might prefer an image of the child with a telephone pole coming out of the top of his head, but a happy, beautiful smile and lovely lighting. Backgrounds are important, but subjects rule the image.
I liked the soft muted color and the rain drops in my image too.
My comment about the "stripey" background was really to see if you were reading this thread, as I welcome your comments and judgments a lot.
The first, third and fourth image are uncropped but edited frames preceding the 2nd cropped image which I posted above. All four frames were shot with the same exact time code to the second. The strip here is a screen capture from my Lightroom library view. I had hoped the time codes would show, but they do not.
Lest readers think I disagree with Paul.... I actually do agree with Paul's comments about the water/forest junction line but feel since it is at the wing's tip ( rather than more central to the wing ) that it is acceptable for this image. If that blue/brown line ran right through the bird, I would bin the image too.
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