Since I picked up the 70-200 1:4 L for my Rebel XT back in January, I've been pushing the heck out of it for birding (despite the obviously "short" limitation of said lens ). In that time I've had half a dozen encounters with great blues, but always at a distance.
All that changed this evening when I was getting ready for work. While putting on my shoes at the back deck, I saw the shadow of large wings in the distance, and ran inside for my camera, hoping for the best. After a frenzied image burst, I came out with one good shot.
To my dismay I had left the camera set to ISO 1600 from the evening before. So I've done my best to hide the digital noise, blown highlights in the face, and horizontal banding in the shadows of the wings. This also might have been better if I had processed it at home on CS2. But being impatient to get this up, I used Faststone on my work computer.
Thanks for looking.
Jul 31, 2008 at 08:52 PM
anthony whitmo Offline • • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
Well that's quite the story And I'd venture to say we've all been there, unprepared with camera NOT in hand and then scrambling for the camera to capture the moment.
For ISO 1600 and Rebel XT >> I'm a bit surprised. Looks good so I'm guessing it was exposed to the RIGHT RIGHT
Thanks Ant. Yeah, I think I was RIGHT THERE, leaning at the edge of over exposure. At least, thanks to Av mode at 4.0 I froze the image nicely. 1/4000 will do that.
Well the good thing is that rarely happens twice with the settings so figure you got that out of the way for a while As mentioned you did a great job to salvage the shot and it looks pretty darn good considering. Hey, next one will be the winner, that is a very sharp lens, should hold up to a good crop so just get your best shots on exposure as close as possible and work up from there, good luck!
Yep , these are sure are very shy birds and difficult to "catch", I like your perseverence and you have done well ideed. maybe you culd reprocess in CS2 later and repost, I feel you can recover plenty detail from the shadows under the wings too.
Been there, done that like most others I suspect. Nice that you got one good enough to salvage and well done for posting. I agree with Mabidally, it would be nice to see what more you can do with it on CS2.
Martin
So I finally had a chance to sit down with CS2. I'm not sure how different the reults are, as compared to the photo at the top. I tried to reveal some detail under the wings, without abandoning the natural look of the shadow. I also attempted to unsharp mask the eyes and beak, while attempting to avoid artifact.
). In that time I've had half a dozen encounters with great blues, but always at a distance. 
