Rainbow Bee Eater

[Toddyh]

Been trying to catch one of these guys for ages. Think I finally have a pass mark but keen to see what others think.

#1


#2

[Isac]

It's a "YES" from me. We just need 3 more to get the 4 "Yes's".

[Grumpy John]

It's yes from me also. Where did you capture this shot Toddy?

[Toddyh]

Thanks guys. This guy was in Pago Mission (abandoned) right up on the coastline in the Kimberly. I've also seen them in the desert and the Victorian High Country.

[seaslug]

Yes here too. Lovely looking bird!

[Ironwood]

And my yes brings up the 4.
Both are good shots.

[wigz]

They look very good to me Todd. Unanimous so far.

A couple of nitpicks.

In #1 there is a faint mark going from the top left corner towards the birds feet. It could be an out of focus branch or where you have cloned out a branch.

In #2 I would remove the branch on the lower right edge and the twig under the bird's tail.

These are just pp issues, I think you have nailed these.

[Toddyh]

Thanks guys.
No cloning done Alan. So just out of focus branches. I don't think there's much I can do about #1 but I'll have another look at #2.

[Isac]

See you in the Semi Finals Todd!! I agree with the comments from wigz and would take it further and remove everything except for the branch the bird is perched on and I'd drop in a soft sky (with or without clouds) to really make the bird pop. Maybe like this.

[wigz]

Nice work Isac.I think I see small haloes around the birds, but this is probably a rather quick demo. I'm always wary of big changes to my images as I'm not confident I can pull it off. Your edits lift these already good images to a higher level.

[Isac]

Only a quick edit but the halo is caused by the background being almost white. I used the "blend if" for doing the sky which will leave some halo. Easy to remove by making a composite image of all layers, then create a new layer (set to Darken mode) and with the clone tool (set to soft), sample from the sky and on the new layer, just run over the edges where the halo is to replace it with the sky colour. Cool and quick way to fix.

[Toddyh]

Nicely done Greg. I definitely to not have the ability to do that.
You might have gone a tad too far though and edited away the long tail feather. The skinny piece protruding from the tail is actually part of the bird.

[Isac]

Oops! I've edited the 2 images and removed the halos that wigz picked up.