Black winged stilt (Himantopus himantopus)

[Jonathan Ashton]

I may have posted similar or indeed this image previously, I have been revisiting the processing of images I captured in India in 2019, I will be interested to gauge your opinion.
Olympus E-M1X
Focal Length : 210.0mm
Focal length in 35 mm film : 421.0mm
Exposure mode : Manual exposure
ISO Sensitivity : 800
Exposure compensation : +0.3 EV
Shutter : 1/1250 sec
Aperture : F9

[Arthur Morris]

Sharp with a good exposure. I like the long legs and the raised foot. But that is about it. The white reflections in the water are very distracting as is the crud in the grass lower left. The head turned away is the final nail in the coffin. And the crop (or the original proportions) make zero sense to me.

with love, artie

[Steve Kaluski]

Ditto the above positives Jon, but my turn now, how do you address 'the wall' both you and Andreas refer to in Wildlife with images like this?

TFS
Steve

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi Jon ... subject looks good to me in terms of detail , tone and color . Walking pose is nice ...
The water and grass is what it was in real life ... not much you could have done . Shot from a Gypsie ??
The typical Indian muddy waters ... are not very attractive , most of the time . Maybe you can change the hue of the greens to something closer to the muddy yellows ... resulting in a maybe more pleasing BG .
But what I do not like is that boxy crop that you post " often" since your move to Olympus . I am thinking too traditional .... sorry .

TFS Andreas

[Andreas Liedmann]

Ditto the above positives Jon, but my turn now, how do you address 'the wall' both you and Andreas refer to in Wildlife with images like this?

TFS
Steve

Hey Steve , which " wall " are you talking about ???
As posted the bird is far from banging against the walll ....:bg3:.... plenty of room to walk into , IMHO .

[John Mack]

Long legs on this bird. I could see some cropped of the top.

[Mike Poole]

I love the pose, but he / she really needed not to facing away from us - I find there needs to be some significant environmental interest for these angles to stand a chance of working. If only they'd listen as we're whispering 'turn towards me'!

Mike

[Jonathan Ashton]

Thanks for your comments everyone, I appreciate them even if I don't agree!! Maybe I could have modified the background but I tried to replicate what I saw, the crop doesn't worry me one iota, people get used to 3:2 or similar that's just fine, I have now gotten used to 4:3 - no big deal for me - one crop or another. My primary intention is to portray the subject as naturally as possible in it's surroundings not to make a flawless portrait style image suitable for a coffee table book. We all have our preferences - again that's just fine with me.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Fair enough .... Jon !!!
It is good to stay your ground , if your are confident with your output ...... regardless what we might think .

Cheers Andreas

[Arthur Morris]

Thanks for your comments everyone, I appreciate them even if I don't agree!! Maybe I could have modified the background but I tried to replicate what I saw, the crop doesn't worry me one iota, people get used to 3:2 or similar that's just fine, I have now gotten used to 4:3 - no big deal for me - one crop or another. My primary intention is to portray the subject as naturally as possible in it's surroundings not to make a flawless portrait style image suitable for a coffee table book. We all have our preferences - again that's just fine with me.

Sir Jon,

If you are happy posting images with zero artistic merit and stating that "That's what it looked like," I am fine with that. For me, that would be a pissed-poor excuse.

with love, artie

[Jonathan Ashton]

Sir Jon,

If you are happy posting images with zero artistic merit and stating that "That's what it looked like," I am fine with that. For me, that would be a pissed-poor excuse.

with love, artie

Artie you just don't get it. I am not an artist and I do not try to be one - and even if I tried I would make a poor one.
I like natural history, I try to portray it in it's natural state, as near as possible to how I recall it. I admit I do make minor modifications but I keep them to a minimum, nature is random, it is not always picture perfect, and I can live with that. I could turn it round and ask why improve on nature purely to satisfy aesthetic taste, isn't nature good enough? Clearly not but we won't see eye to eye on this subject ... and that is one of the best features of this forum we all have different ideas of what makes a pleasing image.