A goose and a duck.

[Erithacus]

It was taken in a hot afternoon during my lunch visit to a restaurant. The restaurant is built on a pond. I used CPL to cut off the glare and reflection, and to soften the harsh lighting.

f5.6, 1/640s, ISO100, 92mm.

C&C will be very much appreciated.

[Ridgetop]

The harsh midday light always makes any photo in the sunlight pretty difficult to pull off. The hard shadow under the goose's face and in the neck area doesn't help the pic too much and the detail in the duck's face and front body are pretty much shadowed out. Basically you end up with a pic that says "Yep, duck and goose". I do like the quirky look from the duck though as this kind of saves the picture in my opinion. I think in the future you may want to stick to shade or morning/evening light which can really bring out the feathers and their detail. Also, you have a better chance at getting a catch light in the birds' eyes which adds a lot of life to the picture.

[Erithacus]

The harsh midday light always makes any photo in the sunlight pretty difficult to pull off. The hard shadow under the goose's face and in the neck area doesn't help the pic too much and the detail in the duck's face and front body are pretty much shadowed out. Basically you end up with a pic that says "Yep, duck and goose". I do like the quirky look from the duck though as this kind of saves the picture in my opinion. I think in the future you may want to stick to shade or morning/evening light which can really bring out the feathers and their detail. Also, you have a better chance at getting a catch light in the birds' eyes which adds a lot of life to the picture.

Thanks for the input. This is what I want to hear.

[daq7]

The comment about the mid day light is spot on, but if you are not a purist, you could still work with this by taking int in camera raw. If you do that you have multiple exposures to work with and can make the light you want to some extent. It is heresy to photography purists, but if you are more of a painter than a photographer, you can consider it.

[Don Schaeffer]

There seems to be a bunch of ruffled feathers beside the goose there. It's disturbing--like something smashed. What is that?