Juvenile Cooper's Hawk, and a strange observation

[snostorm]

Hi All,

I was coming home from the Opthamologist's office, wearing shades because my pupils were still dilated from the drops. . . I couldn't really see well, but noticed that there was a big bird in one of the dead trees just off the parking lot. I drove closer, and could almost tell it was a hawk. I grabbed the K10 w/ FA*300/4.5 and 1.7x AFA and, totally trusting the AF, got about 10 shots off before the hawk decided he'd had enough.

These are about 1/4 frame crops, PP'd for PF , then resized and sharpened a touch .





I'm planning on cloning out one of the intervening branches and replacing the missing tail feather, but will add that later when I can see better.

Another thing that I noticed for the first time was -- with my pupils dilated, I could see significant purple fringing at all high contrast areas in my vision -- no optics involved, just my eye's "wide open" so to speak. Talk about "seeing what the camera sees" and looking at things from a photographer's eye. . .:shock:

Scott

[snostorm]

Hi All,

I had a chance to play with #2, adding a tail feather, and cloning out the branch.

Tell me what you think



Scott

[mtngal]

You drove closer? I didn't think you were supposed to drive right after getting your eyes dilated, like something in the neighborhood of 4 hours?

In any case, that's pretty impressive for someone who was just guessing as to the focus.

[Lyrics51]

Scott, Nice pictures. I like #1 because of the direction of his face. I like #3 because of the tail feathers. Perhaps you could use a little PS and meld the two!

Glenn

[rhermans]

These make me so jealous ...
ps nice work cloning out the branch

Ronny

[Dal1970]

There I was, coming out of the opticians - K10D with me.....



So GREEN here..



Great shooting



Dal

[WackyRoger]

Great shots especially for the conditions.


TOTALLY WACKY roger

[snostorm]

Lyrics51 wrote:

Scott, Nice pictures. I like #1 because of the direction of his face. I like #3 because of the tail feathers. Perhaps you could use a little PS and meld the two!

Hi Glen,

Okay, here's a quick and dirty job on #1. The clone of the branch went okay, but for some reason, I had some trouble with the tail feather -- and still don't think it's right. I had that feeling when I was choosing one to PS, and I guess I was right, but the eyes are usually drawn to the bird's face, so it might not be that noticeable.


Here's the original again






Scott

[snostorm]

Hi Harriet, Glen, Ronny, Dal, and Roger,

Thanks for taking a look and taking the time to comment.

I'm surprised that nobody commented about the purple fringing I was seeing with my pupils dilated -- maybe I'm the only one that thinks it strange. . . I always thought that it was just a lens/camera thing.

Harriet -- The office is only a few blocks away, and I'm still feeling the effects of the last gout attack. Traffic is pretty light at that time day around here, so I thought I'd chance it. I could see reasonably well, though, and would have walked back, then gone back for the car later if I wasn't confident of being able to do it safely.

I rarely do the cloning thing, but was pretty frustrated because I get so few chances at raptors, even though they aren't really rare around here (quite a few hawks and falcons). They seem to have a special radar when it comes to me -- whenever I get close enough to even get a marginal shot with the long glass, they all seem to wait until I'm almost ready to press the shutter, and gone. . . I do have a lot of shots of blurred tails and feet tho. . .

Here's one that's more typical of my raptor shots! . . . and yes, there are at least 8 specks of dust on the sensor. . . gone now (I hope)



Scott

[2many]

These are excellent pictures, You know me I love bird shots.