Little Owl II

[Andreas Liedmann]

Hi folks ...
one week ago I discovered a Little Owl location by pure luck , after some more research I got permission from the landowner to work partially on his property .
To my surprise there was a breeding site and the Owlets already left the nest ( at least one ) at that time .
Meanwhile there are 3 Owlets on the property , spread out .
Two in a larger cherry tree almost not reachable due to the density and height of the tree .
The first that left the nest ... decided to stay in a messy place .... a pile of wooden boards from a older building that was smashed some years ago . So the scenery is not very nice .... but I loved to photograph there , as this are my first close encounters with this species and just round the corner .
Here is one of the adults .... for sure more to come
Image taken very late in the evening ..


Canon EOS R3
RF 400 2,8 IS L + 2x TC
Monopod with Gimbal

F 5,6 ; Iso 10.000 ; 1/100 sec

Processed with Capture One and PSCC 2023 ; cropped for comp to about 80 % of FF
Left the shot wider to avoid pixel bashing and to show the " ugly " environment , would for love to have a more " natural setting "
Was thinking to remove the cracks in the wall behind the owl , but decided just to, lower the contrast and lighten them in post


Thanks for watching and commenting to my previous postings

Cheers Andreas

[kevin Hice]

Happy you got the owl Andreas. I think you handled it about as well as you could. The owl looks great, and as for the background it is what it is. I am not bothered by the cracks as much as the blob to the left below the horizontal crack. The wood is not that bad either. At least it is weathered.TFS

[Joseph Przybyla]

Hi Andreas, I like the image. Your Little Owl looks so much like the Burrowing Owl here. Hey, you have to shoot them where you find them, the cracks in the wall are fine with me. The colors look as I would imagine judging from our Burrowing Owls here. Nice focus on the bird, thank you for sharing.

I noticed that you used a monopod with a gimbal head. I assume a full-size gimbal for a tripod. If so here is an alternative that I use and have even gotten Artie to use at times, a Wimberly MonoGimbal head for a monopod.

https://www.tripodhead.com/products/monopodhead-main.cfm

[Andreas Liedmann]

Thanks Kevin and Joe for your kind comments , much appreciated .

@ Joe ... was already thinking about the MonoGimbal , thanks for reminding me :wave:

[Arthur Morris]

Ah, this post explains the boards.

with love, artie

[Jonathan Ashton]

The owl looks very well I like the attentive pose. Pleased you got the shot, it's always rewarding to get something for the first time. I appreciate cropping is not good for quality but would you have lost a great deal by cropping just a little more? - Did you try it? For me the owl is a little small in the frame.

[Andreas Liedmann]

Thanks Jon ... no I have not tried , as I know the results when cropping hard . Apart from that I do like the wider aspect , albeit the setting is really ugly .... it will be worse with some other postings I will make of the Owls . Might be not nice for the eye ... for me too , but that's where they do live .
Funny enough the first Owlet has left the pile of boards and is flying around all over the place .... the second one moved into the same pile , maybe the parents do guide them to that spot . The nesting site is about 20m meters away in that cherry tree .

Cheers Andreas