Jawbone revisited

[Grumpy John]

Now that we are allowed a bit more freedom to move around, I took advantage of the nice weather in Melbourne today drove over to Jawbone flora and fauna reserve hoping to get some half decent bird images. Unfortunately there was not much birdlife to be seen today, although I did manage to capture a seagull trying to throw his weight around, the other seagulls were pretty much ignoring him.

#1


#2


#3


#4



#5


#6

[Ozzie_Traveller]

G'day GJ

Some beaut ones there - plenty of fine feathers on display
Phil

[Grumpy John]

Thanks Phil. There weren't many birds there but I was so happy to be out of the house and behind the camera again that it didn't really bother me.

[Isac]

Got to agree with Phil (which is not uncommon for me). All well framed and good action. The back of the little black cormorants is always a good shot and the head turn makes it all that much better. Good pics John.

[Grumpy John]

Thanks Isac, very happy with the cormorant shot. The Siggy 150-600 does a good job, no need to enhance the eye colour in PP the image is pretty much SOOC except for a bit of cropping.

[Grumpy John]

The more I look at #2 the more I like it, so much so that I did a tighter crop. I added a bit more space to the top of picture while I was at it.
I love this pose, it reminds of the Karate Kid about to do the crane kick. I also like the fact that I was able to get his eye between the feathers, more A than C, the water splashes and droplets only enhance the image.



What I don't like about the image is the bits of "flora" intruding in to the image. I have tried a few different techniques to remove them, but I'm not happy with the results.

[Isac]

Easy fix for getting rid if the foreground stems John. I just used "Content Aware" in small amounts and then a bit of cloning. I also think the crop looks better as a landscape which gives the gull somewhere to look into (positive space). HSL to dull down the background and boost the water colour. Also added a gradient and lens blur for some DOF to make it really pop. I hope you don't mind the edit. Others members may have a different take on it though.

[Grumpy John]

Thanks Isac, that looks pretty good. Do you still have the .PSD file, if so would you mind sharing your workflow in the Photoshop section. You've manages to retain all the elements that I liked about the original image, maybe just a bit more room at the top. I think that I may have trying to do too much at once.