Last Light Short-billed Dowitcher.

[Daniel Cadieux]

I managed to slowly belly-crawl right up to this gorgeous individual just as the sweetest of lights was shining warmly on it. Taken last April at the far end of Fort Desoto's East beach (Florida).

Canon 7D + 100-400L @400mm, manual exposure, evaluative metering, 1/1600s., f/8, ISO 800, handheld, small crop below and left, lightened the iris slightly.

[dankearl]

I don't think you could get much sharper than this!
Gorgeous light and nice subject.

[Don Lacy]

Wonderful light and detail Daniel

[wendell westfall]

Perfect image . . .

[Grace Scalzo]

Fantastic. The light is beautiful.

[Sidharth Kodikal]

Stunning light and amazing IQ, Daniel. Eye contact is great and I especially like your DOF. You ought to write a book on field craft ;-)

[PhilCook]

Lovely light and golden tones Daniel, I especially like the way the light is catching the tip of the beak...ticks all the boxes imo

[Chris Martinez]

Wish the shorebirds down here were half as obliging!!! Excellent fieldcraft!
The bird is beautifully portrayed with that golden light accentuating the tones of the plumage.
I think I'd be inclined to trim off your watermark from the bottom and then the relative amount from the right side of the frame. Just feels like a tiny bit too much bird showing.

Did you manage any displays of rhynchokinesis? That would have been out of this world!!!

[Karl Egressy]

Gorgeous light and excellent details, Daniel.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Did you manage any displays of rhynchokinesis? That would have been out of this world!!!

Thanks Chris, and thanks also for the crop suggestion. I did not get any of that behaviour...but your avatar IS out of this world!:S3:

[vishaljadhav]

Lovely image, the details are fantastic
At 400 mm reaching that close, hats off to you man, its surely fantastic
you surely have a great technique to work with
Amazing image

[Gen Benjamin]

It's all been said but will add my thoughts, beautiful light, wonderful detail, tack sharp and fantastic background
Gen

[Robert Holguin]

Wonderful shot!
Beautiful light, details are superb, terrific comp, and great head angle.
Very well done.

[David Salem]

Like the tight portrait comp and the light and details are beautiful. I like the blue in the BG too. Nice one!

[arash_hazeghi]

excellent light, sweet pose and fantastic details. well done!

[Frank Schauf]

Beautiful portrait, great details and eye contact.

[Shawn Zierman]

Class image. Great dof for the close-up.
The plumage just glows in the low angled light!
Perfectly parallel to the image sensor.