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Commons:Featured picture candidates/File:Larus occidentalis in flight (Bodeda Head).jpg

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File:Larus occidentalis in flight (Bodeda Head).jpg, featured edit

Voting period is over. Please don't add any new votes.Voting period ends on 3 Feb 2016 at 14:57:49 (UTC)
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Hey Ikan, thanks a lot for your feedback. When shooting wildlife, I like to provide context to the viewer whenever possible. In this case the gull is shown above the cliffs of Bodega Head. Here's a photo of the site. Now, why does it matter in this case? Because western gull are strictly marine and you'd rarely encounter them inland (a distinctive feature of this species). So, that's why I liked this frame better than the other 500+ that I took yesterday: it puts the bird in the context of the ocean and the brown cliffs (with the benefit of possibly providing some additional encyclopedic value). However, I fully respect your opinion. So, thanks again for your feedback and all the best. --Frank Schulenburg (talk) 22:06, 25 January 2016 (UTC) [reply]
Wow, 500+ photos! I fully understand and respect your explanation. I think the entire photo looks fine until I make it full-page size or bigger. I'll live with it for a while and see whether I grow to like it as a whole, but I wonder how the photo would look if you sharpened the background slightly. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:42, 25 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Sharpening a heavily blurred background just brings out the noise in the photo. You can't get back what is lost. If you want more detail in the background, one needs to use a smaller aperture, but then it would get more distracting, not less. The background is already quite dark. -- Colin (talk) 09:01, 26 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
So with a smaller aperture, the background could be somewhat clearer is what you're saying, but you'd find that it distracts you from looking at the bird? -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:43, 26 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Not only distracting but it would be come increasingly hard to separate the bird from the background. This just a 2D image so our brain has no stereo vision to create a 3D picture. We therefore rely on other perspective clues such as focus (background out-of-focus) and contrast (increasing haze with distance). Google for "background separation" and "bokeh". There's subjective aspects of course, and here Frank wanted the background to be partly recognizable as sea/cliffs. There's more to lens design than just sharpness and maximum aperture. Some lenses produce a more pleasing out-of-focus effect than others, some handle the transition between in-focus and out-of-focus better and some have good micro-contrast. Also one can't change one of the standard variables (aperture, shutter speed, ISO) without affecting the others, possibly negatively. Frank needs a fast shutter speed for birds-in-flight and a lowish ISO to avoid noise. So there's a limit to how detailed/in-focus he can make the background even if he wanted to. -- Colin (talk) 10:10, 26 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for explaining. -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 11:30, 26 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Confirmed results:
Result: 18 support, 0 oppose, 0 neutral → featured. /George Chernilevsky talk 09:52, 31 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]
This image will be added to the FP gallery: Animals/Birds/Charadriiformes
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