I took this picture a couple weks ago, and It's sort of been bothering me, as I think the placement of the bird in the frame is fine, but the water is rather distracting. If given this shot what would you have done? Cropped in on the bird? Said "screw it", and waited for a better shot?

Just curious.

Thanks!

Adam Harrison

-- Adam Harrison (eros@ncd.com), July 29, 1998

Answers

I think the water is actually a pretty nice background. I like the way the bird appears to be standing against the direction of the waves, makes it appear strong and thoughtful. Nice subtle colors on the bird to break up the white...are they natural, or due to the lighting?

It would be nice if there was more contrast between the bird and water (although that may be the scan, as it appears the top of the wing is blocking already), perhaps a polarizer? Also, the top of the bird's head gets cut off in the reflection on the bottom.

-- Andrew Kim (andy_roo@mit.edu), July 29, 1998.

actually, i find the composition and the nature of the background to be excellent. my only complaint is that i wish the bird was "whiter". but one can't always alter reality, right?

-- wayne harrison (wayno@netmcr.com), July 29, 1998.

The composition is great and the photo has a wonderful peaceful feeling. The image just seems a little murky -- as if it was underexposed.

-- Steve Leroux (steve@bigadventures.com), July 29, 1998.

I agree with everyone else that the water is a beautiful background. The "pose" of the bird is very good, too. I think I'd have cropped this pic to square format. That would place the bird in the center, but so what? I think the bird is not totally in focus (could be due to jpeg compression, I think this here 50K limit is pretty harsh) and not white enough (could be due to scan/lack of correction after scan).

-- Philipp Leibfried (phil@provi.de), July 29, 1998.

The composition is wonderful. More "tension" could have helped (wait for the bird to lean forward as he concentrates on his prey...if there is any in that water... ;>

As for waiting for a better day? No, shoot first, ask questions later! ;> You have to get what shots you can.

It seems underexposed, yet the highlights of the bird are almost gone. Was this a sunny day? Can you give more details, re: polarizer, sky/lighting conditions, etc? Is this a scan of a print or a slide/neg? How does the original compare?

I love the shapes of the little waves, but the problem to me is tonality. The water tones are all pretty much the same and the only real contrast is between the bird and the water. Having more contrast in the water itself would liven this up... But it's not your fault the water didn't cooperate. ;>

What I remember of my one trip to Shoreline Park is the water there isn't very lively to begin with. Try getting further away from "civilization". :> You'll be amazed how your nature photos improve when you get far away from a city. ;>

Lovely composition. Very peacefull.

Best Regars,

Keith

-- Keith Clark (ClarkPhotography@spiritone.com), July 29, 1998.

I would have said, "Screw it", and waited for a better picture. But unfortunatelty, the final outcome of the picture and what the eye sees through the viewfinder, along with all the emotion, make it safer to take the photo and hope. As for suggestions. I would have cropped the excess water away (to the same proportion) and placed the bird in the left third of the image so that the subject rather than the water provides a greater focus. As for the image itself, I find the high vantage point at which the photo was taken, and therefore the angle of the water surface in relation to the subject, disturbing. I assume that the loss of focus was a result of the JPEG compression.

I hope these are some helpful suggestions that you were asking for!

-- Adam Liedloff (a.liedloff@qut.edu.au), July 29, 1998.

I like the subject and the waves but I have to wonder whether the picture would have been done more justice as a portrait orientation or even as a square crop job. I don't really think the rule of thirds is appropriate here. What's the bird looking at? (just unused space in the print?)

Yes, doing this shot in portrait mode would have turned a satisfactory shot into something spectacular.

-- bob-bert (rpowell@no-emails-please.net), July 29, 1998.

If given this shot I would try to capitalize on the color of the water and and de-emphasize the detail by using a wider apperture and a longer lens. I agree that the water is distracting. This would be beautiful (if somewhat ordinary) if it had a pin sharp bird, slightly tighter crop, and an out of focus blue-green background. A lower perspective might have given the veiwer a greater sense of intimacy with the birds as well. After that I would wait to see if it was going to do anything interesting (catch fish). Probably would not say "screw it"

-- Mark Meyer (MaMeyer@xsite.net), July 30, 1998.

I'd have waited for a longer lens.

It doesn't work because it's part environmental shot and part portrait. A featureless background is what you want for a portrait, but you need to crop close. For an environmental shot, you need to have more interest in the background. What you have here is a shot that's 10% subject and 90% nothing.

Compositionally, it would have been better to lower the bird in the frame a bit to keep him away from the center vertically. Crop a little off the bottom and you may see what I mean.

-- Mark Ciccarello (mark@ciccarello.com), July 30, 1998.

I think that portions of the water are nice, e.g., to the right of where the bird sits in the frame, but there's too much of it that's not interesting. At least there's no distractiong stuff in all that space! I'd go for the "picture within a picture" and crop tighter...perhaps a long panorama format with the bird at one end and open space to the right...experiment and see what you like!

-- Duane Galensky (duane@wild-light.com), July 30, 1998.

Thanks for all your comments!

The bird is in focus on the picture, but my scanner is not performing as I would expect. I am scanning the print on an HP ScanJet to an SGI Indigo2 Extreme. The final scans are dark and blury. So when I convert the image from an rgb format to jpeg I increase the sharpeness by 50, the gamma by 1.5, and the saturation by 15%. This generally brings the image close to the original print. But, as the white on white details of the egret were blurred out by the scanner, there was no getting it back. I wish PhotoCD was cheaper than a dollar a frame...

The photo equiptment I used:

• Canon Elan IIe
• Quandry 70-300mm f4-5.6
• Tiffen Circular Polarizer
• Kodak Royal Gold 25 <- In response to somes request for a picture of the Egret catching a fish. I got one, but the head is all motion blur, while the body is crystal clear. :-)

But thanks again for all the comments! :-)

Adam Harrison

-- Adam Harrison (eros@ncd.com), July 30, 1998.

This just doesn't work for me. Technically, it's nicely exposed, but that's about it. It suffers from the old "last olive in the jar" syndrome: a nice but too small subject lost amidst too much background.Maybe another martini to soften me up. Perhaps if you'd edged closer or used a longer lens; maybe a vertical shot, rather than a horizontal? The above suggestions for cropping would probably save the day.

-- Gary Watson (cg.watson@sympatico.ca), July 30, 1998.

Adam, I suggest three things that might make this a better shot

1. Compose vertically

2. Make the subject larger in the frame

3. Get down a little closer to the birds level

-- Bill O'Neill (omegamic@vianet.on.ca), July 30, 1998.

I noticed in your equipment list for this photograph that you used a polarizing filter. I think that is contributing to the "murky-ness" of the image because there are no reflections on the water. Removing the polarizer would have left a reflection of the bird on the water, and the water would have looked more blue because it would reflect the sky's color.

Joel Collins

-- Joel Collins (jwc3@mindspring.com), August 03, 1998.

The subject's far too lose for just sitting there. If a subject is just sitting there, fill the frame with it. With this species, in Florida and some other SE USA locations, you don't need long glass to do so. I had one present me with a fish on numerous occasions on Sanibel, too close for my 28-105 zoom at the wide end, but ended up with interesting perspectives I want to reproduce in the future in a more organized fashion.

If this bird were DOING SOMETHING, the loose composition could work. Perhaps you could show why it was doing something. As it is, it looks like a bored bird looking at a bored scene, but that's not what's happening. You haven't caught the story, which a wide shot should do, nor are you close enough to capture the soul...

If you think this is harsh, you should listen to me criticize my own shots, particularly those that get published...

-- Don Baccus (dhogaza@pacifier.com), August 05, 1998.