Is this cheating (cut and paste eagle) ?

Original sky was as blown out as could be. I don't usually like to delve into altering my bird photos other then the basic necessary enhancements.

Does it look too fake ?

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You missed a couple edges (most obvious is the bottom tip of the wing) and otherwise it looks a litle "too" perfect maybe. Or the shadows don't correspond...something​.

cdi-ink.com wrote in post #2057366
You missed a couple edges (most obvious is the bottom tip of the wing) and otherwise it looks a litle "too" perfect maybe. Or the shadows don't correspond...something​.

Rough draft due to having too much fun last night and not seeing all that clear.

The eagle is a bit noisy, but the concept is fine. Show me a photo in any magazine you care to mention, that hasn't been reworked, and I'll show you a ho hum photo.

Yeah it's cheating, but I do it
Not a bad job, it's tricky though to get the colors, lighting and WB to actually work together. A lot of the times these are very recognizeable as "fakes"

I like the shot, if you hadn't mentioned it, I would have just taken it for a course of good luck. Well done.

It looks like the eagle was photoshopped to another shot of a sky.

Tee Why wrote in post #2057802
It looks like the eagle was photoshopped to another shot of a sky.

That's probably because it was.

cdi-ink.com wrote in post #2057822
That's probably because it was.

My point exactly.

I think it looks pretty darn good. I would have blurred the background some.

Crypto wrote in post #2058166
I think it looks pretty darn good. I would have blurred the background some.

That would be my suggestion too. The DOF is way too good. You might even want to take another picture of the sky and clouds but with the camera manually focused much closer.

I like the concept and a little more work on the shot ( when you have not been up so late the night before ) could be worth the effort. You could try one of the blur filters in PS and then very carefully ( on the edges especialy) history brush the Eagle so the BG is more OOF.

In Australian terms 'like tits on a bull'. Sorry about the negativity. My view is if you can't get out and do it naturally, don't do it, unless your doing for a glossy advertising magazine. Constructive critisim, the perspective is wrong. By this I mean the sky/cload appears to be taken from directly below looking up whereas the eagle is obiously on a lower trajectory.

Trace wrote in post #2058766
In Australian terms 'like tits on a bull'. Sorry about the negativity. My view is if you can't get out and do it naturally, don't do it, unless your doing for a glossy advertising magazine. Constructive critisim, the perspective is wrong. By this I mean the sky/cload appears to be taken from directly below looking up whereas the eagle is obiously on a lower trajectory.

No offense taken. I would agree with you 99.9% of the time. I was just bored and playing around.

Thanks all for your comments. That's what I was looking for. Gary I took your advice and blured the edges. I have wasted enought time on this and nned to move on.

I am going out in the morning eagle hunting so maybe I will get some cooperative blue skys.

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Trace wrote in post #2058766
My view is if you can't get out and do it naturally, don't do it, unless your doing for a glossy advertising magazine.

So what makes using a flash instead of natural light OK but photoshoping two images not OK?