These shots are brilliant Dennis, absolutely lovely shots indeed.
Even though I've not tried this type of action shot yet, I can imagine how difficult it is to get right.
All the shots look very well processed on my monitor with fine detail and very nice colour renditions.
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Originally Posted by Dennis
I’m gradually getting a handle on the need open up 1½ to 2 stops to compensate for the bright backgrounds, in an attempt to reveal sufficient detail in the underwing areas, but avoid blowing out the highlights. I’m shooting in Manual mode where I mainly set the aperture to wide open and select a shutter speed 1½ to 2 stops over exposed. I tried spot metering but it was difficult to keep the spot on the bird so the meter was getting fooled by the bright sky.
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I remember reading that (at least in the older models, 12 bit) that 3/4's of the detail is contained in the second half of the histogram and hence the recommendation to always shoot to the right of the histogram to capture maximum detail.
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Originally Posted by Dennis
Next, I must remember to switch to either low speed or high speed continuous shooting mode so I can blast of several frames with one press of the shutter release, as these creatures just swoop by so quickly.
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That was going to be my next suggestion, especially on the 40D with it's 6.5 fps burst mode.
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Originally Posted by Dennis
Then that brings us to processing where I have been experimenting with the Shadow/Highlight function in CS3, which helps fill in the dark shadows and tone down the bright highlights. I’ve noticed that this can leave a bright rim around the outline of the bird.
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Another superb adjustment available in CS3 ACR is the "Recovery" adjustment, a simply brilliant addition to the ACR 'toolbox' which allows you to recover fine detail on RAW images before going into CS3 'proper'.
Also you can set preferences to allow you to edit jpgs using CS3 ACR too!