Male Downy Woodpecker.

[Daniel Cadieux]

North America's smallest species of woodpecker and, IMO, arguably the cutest and sweetest. This one is the male, told by the red nape. It was attracted to a suet cake just out of the frame. Here I like the slightly open wing flight feathers which made for a slightly more interesting image than the other few form this series that had the wing fully closed.

Canon 7D + 500mm f/4 II + 1.4TC, manual exposure, evaluative metering, 1/2000s., f/8, ISO 800 (settings histogram checked), natural light, handheld, small crop fro comp (mostly top and left), darkened pupil, lightened iris.

[gail bisson]

Hi Daniel,
Before reading your description, my first thought was -I love the sweep of the partially opened wing.
Great IQ and I like the POV being slightly above him.
Black and whites look great,
Gail

[Geoffrey Montagu]

Like that you captured this beauty on a Birch tree Daniel. I was initially struck by the feather richness of the blacks and whites with all the details. Nice BG and very well done post production work.

Geoffrey

[douglas hayes]

D-yes I enjoy these little peckers and good crisp capture on the facial feathers.

[Frank Schauf]

Excellent shot with a great perch.

[christopher galeski]

very nice image,sharp with great detail,nice BG.