Snowy owl - last light

[Grace Scalzo]

Taken on inauguration day, maybe the flag pole is symbolic? Anyhow, a nice owl, hardly any light, but what there was left was the most delightful color.

Thank you for looking and for your comments. I appreciate and consider them all.

1/640, f5.6, 1/400
Canon 50D, 500mm f4 + 1.4tc + tripod

[DustinFinn]

Nice wing position, nice eye contact, but overall this doesn't work for me;
- Bird is a little small in the frame.
- Bird is too close to the flag pole and they compete for same space.

Glad these birds are still around.

[Juan Aragonés]

The square format is not one of my favourites and i think that I would go for a different format in this image (maybe a vertical crop or a landscape format with more rrom in the direction of flight. I do not mind about the bird being small in the frame because I think that you were looking not for a full frame portarit but for an image that tells a story. Both the owl and the pole doesn´t seems to have the usual sharpness of your excelent images. BTE¿W, I like a lot the bird´s pose, position of the wings and head turn :-)

[Jeff Nadler]

Grace, In my experience, there is a possible use or benefit of such a wide variety of compositions, that it is almost impossible to discount anything as not valuable-as long as technically good (shaprness, exposure, etc.) This is not my personal favorite of your owl shots and not a composition I really love or would be inclined to put on my website. My initial reaction was to simply post-I don't love it. But in expanding my thinking, it is highly possible that such a photo would be sought after and really desired by a newspaper, or news organization because it might click nicely with a story or concept. Example-local newspapers reporting about the influx of snowys from the north into our cities and suburbs this year. Guess what? If I were an editor, I would choose your photo here over all the beautiful ones of snowys on dunes, snowy landscapes, photogenic fence posts. Your photo would better paint the story of owls in populated areas, which they are!

I don't like and choose to take shots of birds on bird feeders. I don't like them! But I just lost a nice monetary opportunity requesting certain birds on a feeder. Darn.

In summary, being creative as you did here may not have mass appeal but every unqiue image may have a value.

[Grace Scalzo]

Thanks for the thoughtful critiques offered. This was the last image taken on a real productive afternoon, and it is really not much to speak of in many ways. And yet, there was something about it that I liked....maybe the colors and maybe the gold flag pole and the color of the owl's eye. Maybe the moment lingers in my head and I like that better than the actual image. In any case, I appreciate you looking and taking the time to reflect on my image.