Black-billed Magpie

On a recent drive through the eastern Sierra I found some nice hawks and a couple of Meadowlarks on quaint fence posts. Also found this magpie. It was facing to the right with the face in the shade, but eventually gave me the head turn I was requesting. For about half a second. I was shooting out my car window, stopped in the middle of the road (no pulloff close). After getting this I slowly pulled up to try for a better light angle, but it decided to leave.

Canon 7D2, 100-400 II at 350. ISO 800, 1/320 at f/7.1. Handheld. Early morning light and smoke from fires. BG is a pasture of brown grass. Cropped to 70% of the full frame. Into PS to darken a lighter area at the top edge and a minor dose of NR that wouldn't be noticeable in the JPEG here.

Hi Diane,

I love the hue and direction of the light and the background. The details on the bird are perfect!

For me, the crop feels a little tight, not profoundly so, a little more canvas on all sides but the bottom may do it.

Wish I had birds like that on the side of the road

Thanks for posting this beauty, Diane!

Ross

I like the sharpness, pose, light and sweet BG color. The perch is not ideal but that's where it landed. Nice image Diane!

I really like the light angle and the way that the face is lit. I do wish for a more weathered perch as the brightness of this one tends to pull my eye toward it.

Beautiful light and nice pose.
Great color palette as well.
I like all the " lines" in the image ie. vertical lines in the perch and diagonal lines created by the wing feathers and tail. Quite neat!

Works for me... lovely image, Diane. Love the light, colors and composition. Thank you for sharing.

Lovely image in beautiful light, Diane.

Thanks, everyone! I agree abut the perch being a little too bright -- easy to tone it down with a masked Curves. The crop at the bottom was determined by a need to straighten it a bit, but I cloned in a little more perch and loosen up the crop a bit.

Hi Diane,

Your repost (cloning more post) and uploading it here, is very nice! Love it
Ross