Concentration

What technical feedback would you like if any?

Any advice would be wonderful. Shot at @ 0900 in to the morning light from the waterways of Palo Verde national park. Thick overhead foliage with a few breaks of bright blue sky overhead.

What artistic feedback would you like if any?

How much editing would you do to soften or remove background branch? Would you remove the dirt from the lower whisker hairs?

Pertinent technical details or techniques:

(If this is a composite, etc. please be honest with your techniques to help others learn)
Nikon D500, Nikon 200-500mm lens shot at 1/400, F5.6 ISO 110 390mm

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Ej_jewett

You may only download this image to demonstrate post-processing techniques.

EJ, the lighting on the monkey let’s it stand out from the background very well. The details in the large view and it’s expression are great. I like the bit of stick in it’s beard as that tells me about the monkey’s eating/living behavior. In my mind, that’s the kind of extra that the great portrait photographer’s add to bring a portrait to life. I’m fine with the oof branch (more info about the animal’s environment), but would burn-in the bright bits in the lrc. I’d also use a masked hue/saturation layer (in photoshop) to significantly desaturate the blues, especially the reflected bit at the bottom. It’s easy to see why you like this one.

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Thank you for your thoughtful answer. I will have to practice with photoshop more.

A great portrait, EJ. I agree with Mark on the blue and the highlight on the background log that kind of draws my attention. You can take care of the latter in LR easily enough with the local adjustment brush.

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Ej,

Wonderful image. You have certainly captured some intensity - the look on this guy’s face is something. A fabulous moment.

Lon

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