Raptor i.d. ?

[MARINERMAGNUM]

i'm terrible at id'ing raptors,but it surely will be easy for someone. young bald eagle? this is the 1st time i've used photoshop! i didn't alter the image,just put the frame dealeys on them for a change of pace. he sure looks like he's happy for some reason. must have just ate a carp. had a blue sky,but the sun went under a cloud right when he flew by so the light was poor.

and a goose kicker.

[Steve Foss]

MM, looks like a 1st year juvie bald eagle to my eye. That second one is great, with an excellent dramatic comp. I also love the crop on the goose. It's perfect, for me anyway.

A hint for next time would be to use the exposure compensation feature when shooting a bird with bright highlights against a mid-tone background (the goose image). If you shoot it about -1/2 to -2/3, it will allow some detail in the bright whites but shouldn't make the shadows too dark. Unless, that is, there was good highlight detail in the original goose image and you bumped contrast in post processing, which will kill that highlight detail.

Beautiful compositional work. Good job.

[MARINERMAGNUM]

when you say exposure compensation,do you mean to just wheel down the exposure a couple stops on the big quick dial? or do you mean i should bracket them up and down in exposure?

i didn't add anything except the frames to the images. the sun was hitting that goose really hard though.

thanks for the kind words!

[Steve Foss]

Check your camera manual's index under "exposure compensation." Once you meter the image with the camera, exposure compensation lets you quickly adjust to either overexpose or underexpose. The mid tones of the goose in your image basically match the mid tones of the background, and your camera metered to render the mid tones just right. In doing so, it blew out the bright whites, so underexposing against your camera's meter by 1/2 to 2/3 of a stop would have kept some detail in the whites while maintaining detail in the shadows.

[MARINERMAGNUM]

will do. thanks.

[Deitz Dittrich]

eagle shot number 2.. awesome!!!!

[Swimmer]

Eagle #2 for me also. On the exposure comp thing. It seems that when shooting apurture priority (30d) that the exposure meter is automatically one notch below the center line. It seems to me the camera would always choose the center? Or is it that shooting wide (2.8) the camera compenstates some? I'm just starting to play with the light meter a little now.

[Steve Foss]

Swimmer, it shouldn't automatically go underexposed like that in any mode. It may be you accidentally knocked the rear wheel while you had the "on" switch in the position that allows the dial to change exposure compensation, which stays that way until you physically change it back. To use the rear dial for EC, turn the "on" switch up past "on" to the icon with the line, and then spin the dial to put exposure back dead center on the scale.

Center weighted metering gives more weight to the portion in the middle of the image. It's one of the two I use most often.

The other is partial metering, which meters the center 9 percent of the frame. Partial is especially helpful with the subject is significantly brighter or darker than the background.

The 30D also has true spot metering, which can come in handy sometimes but can easily come back and bite you in the butt, say if you've got a contrasty bird like a Canada goose big in the frame and put the spot meter on its cheek, which will terribly underexpose the shadows, or on its black neck, with will terribly overexpose its white cheek.

Evaluative metering takes a look at the subject, the background, foreground and whether it's backlit or not and comes up with an exposure value. This is a good all-around metering mode that works in a lot of situations.

I don't really know what "It seems to me the camera would always choose the center? Or is it that shooting wide (2.8) the camera compenstates some? " means. Are you asking wether the camera always meters for the center of the frame? If so, the answer is no. If you're asking whether the camera automatically meters for the proper exposure, which is designated by the center hashmark, the answer is yes, unless you set EC to change that. And when you ask about shooting at f2.8, what do you think the f2.8 compensates FOR? I don't understand that part.

[MARINERMAGNUM]

i appreciate the kind words from all of you guys. makes a newbie feel more at home. i meant to include this pic. yesterday instead of eagle #1,but somehow it got lost in the shuffle. i think learning a good way to file and sort images is worse that trying to get them!

this image is not processed,but i think it had a little better light. it was at the long end of my 70-300 so it may be a little soft. he was a long ways away!

[Dbl]

To me it looks like the best of the bunch, nice work MM.

[Swimmer]

Quote:

---

Swimmer, it shouldn't automatically go underexposed like that in any mode. It may be you accidentally knocked the rear wheel while you had the "on" switch in the position that allows the dial to change exposure compensation, which stays that way until you physically change it back. To use the rear dial for EC, turn the "on" switch up past "on" to the icon with the line, and then spin the dial to put exposure back dead center on the scale.

Center weighted metering gives more weight to the portion in the middle of the image. It's one of the two I use most often.

The other is partial metering, which meters the center 9 percent of the frame. Partial is especially helpful with the subject is significantly brighter or darker than the background.

The 30D also has true spot metering, which can come in handy sometimes but can easily come back and bite you in the butt, say if you've got a contrasty bird like a Canada goose big in the frame and put the spot meter on its cheek, which will terribly underexpose the shadows, or on its black neck, with will terribly overexpose its white cheek.

Evaluative metering takes a look at the subject, the background, foreground and whether it's backlit or not and comes up with an exposure value. This is a good all-around metering mode that works in a lot of situations.

I don't really know what "It seems to me the camera would always choose the center? Or is it that shooting wide (2.8) the camera compenstates some? " means. Are you asking wether the camera always meters for the center of the frame? If so, the answer is no. If you're asking whether the camera automatically meters for the proper exposure, which is designated by the center hashmark, the answer is yes, unless you set EC to change that. And when you ask about shooting at f2.8, what do you think the f2.8 compensates FOR? I don't understand that part.

---

Steve, I've been out in the "field" the last week or so, but thought your question(s) should not go unanswered. First, thanks for explaining the inner workings of the Canon. My question about compensating at f2.8...I though perhaps the Camera might somehow auto meter down in certain circumstances and display that...I just used f2.8 as an example. I probably did bump the rear wheel and thus the meter was not centered. The Canon light meter is a pretty nice tool. Hope you don't mind me asking questions and displaying my abject ignorance...it's pretty easy on-line and at this sight...one advantage of the relative anonimity.

[Steve Foss]

We're all learning, Swimmer.

Just the other day I asked what I thought was a dumb Q on a site I belong to where all have paid to be members, and all are pros. I was treated very gently, and it turned out a couple other members had the same question but were afraid to look dumb.

[MARINERMAGNUM]

can anyone i.d. these fruits? i staked out some bushes that were covered with these,but nothing showed up

they [tweets] had been there as there were torn up hulls all over the snow.

other than that,all i saw this weekend was this young eagle who seems to be following me...

and the obligatory quacks...

i did see a bluebird today! is that rare for March? i have a pic of him,but it's not too good. i had to focus manually to get thru a load of tree branches,and thru heat mirage out the truck window. oh well,i'll post them.

he's not the most photo friendly bird either.

i think the heat mirage is why these look so funky...

cross eyed mary?

he looks drunk!

[Swimmer]

MM, not sure about the berry tree ID, but nice shots.

[Steve Foss]

MM, could be cranberry bush. There's a low-bush and high-bush cranberry, and they are very popular as ornamental landscape plantings. If you have a loose shot of the whole bush, that would help.