Merritt III Gatorland 02-09

gluwater

Well now that I'm back home and at work again they have me working 12 hour shifts for the rest of the week and probably Sat as well so I'll be really slow at getting through my pictures but these are what I have so far. They are the first shots I took and are not my best but I wanted to post them to show just how much was learned on the trip. Hopefully looking at these and then looking at my later shots you will be able to see a pretty steep learning curve.

These were all taken with a 20D + 400mm f/5.6.

Cattle Egret starting to get breeding colors:


Gator:


Great White Heron in Flight:


My first ever view of an Osprey and I got him with a fish! This is really underexposed because he was backlit and I was set for white birds at EV-.67:


I hope you like them and with some luck I'll be able to post some more soon.

Osprey Whisperer

Nice series, Nick. That was a wonderful "shoot"...and I look forward to getting back up that way soon. Keep warm in Illinoiz. (Illinoiz transplant).

Glu... I was at Gatorland on the 9th with Michael Allen, Harry..etc. Which one were you? I don't remember meeting you.

Harryb

Good ones Nick. Glad to see you getting some good results.

pathfinder

Nic came in late that afternoon at Gatorland, Mike.

Nice set of captures Nick. Can you crop the egret and get closer to the bird rather than the foliage? It looks cool:):

Try taking your osprey shot and hit ctrl-J to create a duplicate layer and then blend with a screen mode and see if it doesn't lighten up quite a bit. A mask can then be used to darken areas if they are too light. Hit ctrl-J again to lighten even further if necessary.

gluwater

Thanks Mike, as Path stated I arrived late afternoon so I missed you. I was looking forward to meeting you but maybe next year.

Jim, thanks for the input. The Egret was on the far side from the viewing tower so I had to crop it to get it like it is. I will try a tighter crop when I get home and see what I can come up with. I like his pose but hate the background. The Osprey is missing a lot of detail because it is soo under exposed and I tried to get some detail back but didn't like my results. I'll give your suggestions a try.

Rohirrim

Great set Nick. I love that first Egret.

Osprey Whisperer

Too bad we didn't cross paths, Nick. Mike (Michael Allen) and I left pretty early. He had to get back for work the next morning. Wish we could have stayed longer. Looks like you got a bunch of good shots.