Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic.

Our cruise ship docked at Taino Bay in Puerto Plata, and we left the ship on our way to the buses ready for our excursion. As is typical with many cruise ports, we were required to run the gauntlet of souvenir sellers and independent tour guides. This port features people dressed in historical native costumes who would happily pose for photos for a tip. Underneath one palapa, a scarlet macaw perched.

The scarlet macaw is native to Central and South America. With its bright red, yellow, and blue plumage, it is one of the most recognizable parrots in the world. We have seen many of these beautiful parrots on our visits to Central American ports. The brightly colored birds are found in humid evergreen forests, where they live in pairs or small flocks. They are social birds and form strong bonds with their mates. They are intelligent and can mimic human speech.

Scarlet macaws are endangered due to habitat loss and the illegal pet trade. However, several conservation efforts are underway to protect these beautiful birds.

About the photo: I used my Samsung S23U to capture this image underneath a heavily shaded palapa on a mostly cloudy morning. The camera faithfully captured the bright colors, and when I loaded the image into Luminar Neo, I raised the exposure slightly in the shadowed areas. Even with the f/1.8 exposure setting, the background was in sharp focus, and a person standing behind the shrubs on the left of the bird was a distraction. I used Neo’s erase function to remove the person and then masked the dock and background buildings with a brush. Then, I used the Gaussian blur function at only about 10 percent to add some blur to the background.

I encourage fellow bloggers to create their own Cellpic Sunday posts. I never have a specific topic for this feature, and the only rules are that the photo must be captured with a cell phone, iPad, or another mobile device… If you have an image from a drone or even a dashcam, that’s also acceptable. The second rule is to link your challenge response to this post or leave a comment here with a link to your post in the comment. Oh, you don’t have to post it on a Sunday.

John Steiner