I had such a good time photographing my Sandhill Crane family this year (not that you could tell from my three blog entries here, here, and here!)  As I worked with the images for post-processing, I couldn’t resist playing with some of them to create Sandhill Crane digital art versions using Topaz Glow.  When I have average images from cloudy days, or images with cluttered backgrounds, those images tend to be the best candidates for creative post-processing.  So here’s a new side of little Baby Uno:

I liked the image of Mom preening, and Topaz has some aptly-name “Fur and feathers” presets that work very nicely with birds.  If only there was a little colt head sticking out from her back feathers…maybe that’ll be my next rainy-day project. :)

The head angles on both the mom and baby were awesome in this next image.  The catch?  Baby was hanging out right in front of the dead grassy vegetation.  Not the best background!  When you declutter the background, you notice the bug in Mom’s mouth.  Doesn’t that sound like a yummy breakfast?

On my second visit, I got to see Baby for about 15 minutes.  For the rest of the time, I watched Mom and Dad eat.  They gave me some time for close-ups that I wouldn’t have otherwise taken…

Topaz offers a free trial of its tools if you’re at all interested in experimenting with effects on your own photos.  Try it – it’s fun!