Puffin Portrait

[Rachel Hollander]

• Rachel L. Hollander
• Adobe Photoshop CS5 Windows

Those of you who know me know that I mostly stick to the Wildlife and Landscape Fora (or is it forums) but I just returned from 3 days of photographing puffins on Machias Seal Island off of Cutler, Maine so I thought I'd stick my toe in on the Avian Forum.

Canon 7D
70-200 II @ 200mm
1/250
f14
ISO 400
EC -1
HH from a blind. Luminosity mask, levels, curves, cropped for comp, specular highlight removed from bg and sharpened in CS5.

C&C welcome and appreciated. Thanks,

Rachel

 

[Karl Egressy]

Great portrait with a 200 mm lens. I can hardly wait to go there.

 

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Rachel, great to see you posting on this side, you will always be welcome.:w3 Ive always enjoyed the detail and colours on puffins, and in this you have brought them out so well. Overall, well exposed, sharp, and if anything, I would blend in the dark spot in the BG, just infront of the bill.

 

[Daniel Cadieux]

That is one spot I'd love to go to some day! Good exposure, beautiful colours. Had the head been turned more towards us the light would have lit the eye so much more beautifully (and cleared the shadow on the lower mandible). I also think that f/14 was a bit much and made the background/sky transition line more pronounced than should. Lovely portrait though, lots of good details and I like the composition. Hoping to see more!!:S3:

 

[laurie golden]

There are very nice contours on this face, I'm not sure if it is the bird or your processing that brought them out but I like it. You did a great job in capturing and processing. I like the background as is.

 

[Richard Unsworth]

Stunning portrait, stay on Avian please:S3:
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[jack williamson]

Good advice already. This is very sharp and well exposed.

Jack

 

[Rachel Hollander]

Thanks all for the kind comments and suggestions. Plenty more puffin shots to post so I'll stick around Avian for a bit :S3:

Rachel

 

[Lyle Gruby]

One of my bucket list birds. Really sharp, wish the HA was better so it would have illuminated the eye better. Otherwise, really nice portrait, like the the head dissects the horizon.

 

[dankearl]

I agree with a lot of the comments, but glad to see you do birds Rachel, and this is very nice.
Looking forward to more.

 

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi Rachel, a difficult bird to photograph with such contrasting colours White & Black, often throughs the metering out and can be a nightmare in bright conditions, however you have nailed it! Good detail where it counts, good advice above for the future and current processing.

TFS
Steve

 

[Rachel Hollander]

Thanks Lyle, Dan and Steve. As always, much appreciated.

 

[Frank Schauf]

Excellent pose and details, Rachel.