Show your Bird Portraits

AlanF said:
Terrible conditions today, heavy cloud, mist, 1 oC. Used the 400mm DO II native at f/4 at Iso 1000 on 5DS R. This little robin has puffed himself into a ball to keep warm. 100% crop, bird is about 1 mpx from 50 mpx.
Congratulations Alan. It is a superb picture no matter the conditions. Have you used noise reduction? It is quite a clear picture and weakens my resistance to 5DsR...
 
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tron said:
AlanF said:
Terrible conditions today, heavy cloud, mist, 1 oC. Used the 400mm DO II native at f/4 at Iso 1000 on 5DS R. This little robin has puffed himself into a ball to keep warm. 100% crop, bird is about 1 mpx from 50 mpx.
Congratulations Alan. It is a superb picture no matter the conditions. Have you used noise reduction? It is quite a clear picture and weakens my resistance to 5DsR...

Thanks! It has my usual standard minimal processing. RAW into DxO Optics Pro with its PRIME noise reduction and CA/Fringes turned on. Then into PS for sharpening with 0.9 px 100% USM and cropping. The 5DS R is really good with sharp lenses, better than the 7DII. I'll have a play with other software to see what it is like with this shot.
 
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Jack Douglas said:
Hey Jeff, that's great. It's the total package, the whole experience, that is addictive so even when I don't succeed it's exciting and only drives me to try harder. I was only minutes ago called by my wife - hey the Pileated woodpecker is here.

I had been doing AFMA and was then called to tend to my daughter's -20C furnace breakdown yesterday and so today grabbing the camera, everything was incorrectly set and I blew a nice sequence starting with this shot. I wouldn't normally have had this AF choice, but with spot servo AF surely this should have turned out - I'm thinking my 1DX2 has issues. Oh, well. :(

Jack


Looks like the camera read the contrast where the bird's head overlaps the tree.
The AF system reads contrast.
 
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AlanF said:
Terrible conditions today, heavy cloud, mist, 1 oC. Used the 400mm DO II native at f/4 at Iso 1000 on 5DS R. This little robin has puffed himself into a ball to keep warm. 100% crop, bird is about 1 mpx from 50 mpx.

Very puffed up! Nice shot! I won't see robins around here for two months...... unless I watch a batman movie :)
 
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Jack Douglas said:
Alan, gorgeous! Is that moire in the wing feathers?

Jack

There is some Moire in the wing feathers, seen at high magnification but which won't affect the size of prints for my annual album. For birds at medium distance and in flight etc, the lack of AA-filter in the 5DS R gives significantly better results over say the 7DII and the 5DIV. But, occasionally you do get Moire with close-ups and a very sharp lens like the 400mm DO (± 1.4xTC) or even the 100-400mm II, which is the reason I got the 5DIV. Here it is OK, but I once had a kingfisher shot ruined by Moire. I don't know what the bird shooters with the Nikon D500 and 7200, and all the Olympus and Sony cameras find. Perhaps their soft lenses act like AA filters.
 
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