This is a yellow-rumped cacique I captured in the Pantanal region of Brazil. There are two notable things about this shot. First, it took me four days to get -- revisiting the nest several times -- because these birds fly like bullets. I wanted the tail feathers flared and, at the same time, I had to have the wings spread artfully. The second thing that is notable is the original sky was white because I exposed for the black feathers of the bird. I used the new Sky Replacement command in the latest version of Photoshop and, to my surprise, it did a flawless job in retaining all the detail in the nest and in the nesting material in the cacique's mouth. This is, indeed, a revolutionary advancement in digital technology for photographers. My settings for the bird shot were 1/8000, f/5.6, and 3200. Because these birds are so fast, and I was pre-focusing on a spot just in front of the nest, my normal bird-in-flight shutter speed setting of 1/3200 wasn't fast enough to freeze the movement. My frame rate was 14 fps.
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