Wood Duck Image

This is an older image I found using my new LR to process. I tried cropping to meet the rule of thirds but then lost the "plowing forward" look. I know that subject in the middle is bad but any ideas?

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I like the colours in the Ducks face and the colour of the water. Does the refelection of the ducks face in the water exist in the uncropped picture? Anyway i like it. Well done.

Don't let an arbitrary "rule" constrain your editing and prevent you from doing what you really want to do. It really isn't a rule anyway -- it's more like a sensible guideline to be applied as you see fit. It is a good idea to keep it in the back of your mind when looking at ways to compose a shot. However, shots of wildlife are considerably different than posed portraits and landscape images in that you typically have to grab the best shot that you can while you have the chance. During post processing, you can use your own eye to decide what is the best composure.

Want to see the head reflection.

Thanks for your response and comments. This image is not cropped at all therefore no head relection exists. I guess this capture was taken to late as he was coming toward me. I thought of cropping below his belly since the neck reflection leads to "no head".

rathke wrote in post #6044107
Thanks for your response and comments. This image is not cropped at all therefore no head relection exists. I guess this capture was taken to late as he was coming toward me. I thought of cropping below his belly since the neck reflection leads to "no head".

Was this done at a local pond in Arlington? There used to be lots of wood ducks in Pappy Elkins Lake which is just a short walk from where I live, but I have not seen any there this year.

Bill, This was at the Japanese Botanical Gardens in Fort Worth.

bill boehme wrote in post #6042127
Don't let an arbitrary "rule" constrain your editing and prevent you from doing what you really want to do. It really isn't a rule anyway -- it's more like a sensible guideline to be applied as you see fit. It is a good idea to keep it in the back of your mind when looking at ways to compose a shot. However, shots of wildlife are considerably different than posed portraits and landscape images in that you typically have to grab the best shot that you can while you have the chance. During post processing, you can use your own eye to decide what is the best composure.

I absolutely agree. Sometimes the rule-of-thirds advocaters will mention the centralization issue only when no other issues can be found.

Actually, in this particular instance, the duck's eye is at the upper 1/3 horizontal and the wake begins at the lower 1/3 horizontal. Maybe the centered wake is a good thing here. The main elements for consideration with me are the focus, exposure, and color.

I think this is a very interesting shot. I like it even with the reflection ruined by the crop.

The original post was uncropped. I must have misled you with my mentioning a crop which I never did. This one is cropped to remove the neck reflection which seems to be a distraction. (I think it is). Thanks to all for the comments which helps alot!

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I feel the head reflection would of made it outstanding; however, the croped image with less reflection to distract still makes it an excellent photo! Great colors and detail!

I like this comp much better than your original.

I'm having difficulty trying to imagine a workable composition that would include the reflection of the head.