Downy Woodpecker

[Ed Vatza]

One last image from the weekend at Peace Valley Park. I do wish there was more of a head turn but this was as far as he turned his head before flying off into the deeper woods.

50D/ 300 2.8/2x/Tripod

1/2500 sec at f/5.6; ISO 640; 0 EV; Sunny WB; FL 600mm (EFL 960mm)

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Ed,

I feel these kind of images will work if you are trying to show the plumage for biological or identification purposes. I would have loved a head turn. Some how I don't like that branch and that too exiting out of the top left hand corner. It is distracting in my opinion. I think it would have helped if you were at a higher elevation. Thanks for sharing. You could also have tried f8 or higher for greater dof.
Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[Arthur Morris]

Had the bird been leaning back normally this would have been a lot better, but with his upper body leaning away from you you were dead meat as soon as you pressed the shutter button as the posture is very awkward at best and the head is nowhere near parallel to the imaging sensor as it should be. It is not the usual head angle problem but a problem caused by the somewhat unusual posture. Having the light from the left did not help either... The image is sharp and the EXP good enough but this one simply does not work for me.