Find the Difference
The bird was taken on a Caribbean Cruise in March 2011. I was on an upper deck, and these Masked Boobies were flying right along side the ship. The setting sun was taken in Bermuda, also on a cruise, in June of 2023.
I was trying to learn layers in On1, so decided to attempt this circle of birds with the sun in the middle. After much trial and error I was able to complete the composite in June of 2023. I’ve always loved it, but thought it needed some drama.
Today I added a slight sun star, a glow, and enriched some of the colors. I also made a slight change in one of the birds, to give people something to look for.
Post processing notes:
I used On1 as a stand alone app. I did the following on the bird:
Dynamic Contrast, HDR Look, Tone enhancer on the original bird picture.
I duplicated the sun and clouds, flipped one layer and created a composite with the sun in the middle. this would be the background.
I masked the bird so that there was no background. I then duplicated it to make a total of 8. I layered them slowly, rotating each one until it was in the position I liked. I created a new stamped layer of the birds. I then layered that on top of the sun layer and created a final composite layer.
After I had the final composite, I added some final adjustments. Additional color adjustments in the beaks and eyes, sun star on the sun, glow and Center Spot Vignette.
