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Went down to the jetty this afternoon and took a few shots.

All them are were hand held using Nikkor 70-300ED most of them close to 300mm.

Was going to use a polarising filter but left the 62-67mm adapter at home

Some of the images have been cropped.

Any comments/suggestions would be much apreciated.

What would you guys recomend in PP to improve these shots?

So many images - where to start.

I love the last one - perfect.

The first three could all do with a little curves adjustment as they are a little dull (colourwise). Take care though or you'll blow the highlights in the white feathers. I'd also do a USM on them to delineate the feathers more. Of these three I like the second one best.

#4 - no PP other than cropping can fix this for me as the HUGE OOF area (the shallow DOF) is too distracting.

Speaking of distracting, I figure this was a compositional choice, but #6 doesn't work for me either. Crop just on the piers, a little USM and this would be a fantastic image as it has the DOF that #4 lacks

#5 - DOF again - same problem as #4.

Please remember I'm also a picky bastard and others may have wildly different views to me.

Overall very impressive use of the lens and yes, CP could have also improved some of these (there are also commercial "CP" filters for PSCS eg Nik Color Efex have one)

Hi dhess

These are fantastic! I particularly like the 2nd one with the diagonal lines of the jetty. The 4th one is good, but perhaps a little too shallow DOF? I love the 6th and 7th! I have a thing for rust and weathered wood! I have tried things like this before but no where near as great as these....but I will keep trying! Well done! Looks like a lovely spot!

hi dhess i like them all but with pic 4 it would be nice to have the focal point in the middle of pic ,, to draw u right into the pic , and there is a bird there to catch the eye ...
i jst wish i had the time to get out more

The last picture you took is so simple but at the same time beautiful. Some of you guys are so clever with simple things that you capture

Thanks for the replies.

Stormygirl,

Thanks for the kind words. I am a sucker for weathered wood and iron too.

Stubbsy,

Thanks for the harsh words You gave me exactly the kind of feedback I need.

I pretty much knew the DOF was way to shallow and distracting in a few of the shots. I got carried away shooting without paying too much attention to settings.

I am a complete novice with Photoshop and this is pretty much my first attempt at manipulating images half seriously.

Are these any better:

I have played with the courves on the first 2 but have no idea what I am doing.

The third I cropped as suggested.

Tried using the USM on all of them but is way beyond my photoshop skills. I need to do some reading.

Could you possibly recommend USM settings for this image?





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You've probably made the first 2 images a little dull with the curves adjustment. Basically you want a very shallow s shaped curve.

So far as USM is concerned. I have taken the liberty of having a little play with your second image (note this is working on your jpeg - when you play with your originals you'll get better results).

I adjusted the curve slightly to darken the background and enhance the contrast of the bird. I also did a USM of 65%, 3.7 radius, threhsold 6. Basically the best thing here is to play with the percentage etc until you can just see halos around the sharp edges, then drop it back a little. Experiment and you'll see what I mean.

Hope this helps

Thanks for the awesome feed back.

With your adjustments on the second pic, aren't the whites on the egret blown out too much?

dhess wrote:Thanks for the awesome feed back.

With your adjustments on the second pic, aren't the whites on the egret blown out too much?

Well technically no (I checked them in NC), but in reality probably a little - but remember I was working on the jpg!