luck

[John Chardine]

See a recent discussion of the role of luck in wildlife photography:

http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/showthread.php?p=314964#post314964

Here is an example. I returned to Johnson's Mills, New Brunswick on Sunday to photograph migrating Semipalmated Sandpipers. On the way I stopped off at the Nature Conservancy of Canada interpretive centre for the sandpipers and was thrilled at this late date in the summer to see a pair of Common Yellowthroats performing right in front of me with a great but unplanned BG and a great (IMO), again unplanned perch at the right level. The sun angle was also just right and unplanned. The only thing going against me was fairly harsh late morning light.

As you might have gathered I definitely fall on the side of "be prepared but in the end you need luck" camp of wildlife photography.

Here's the male:

All I did was crop and even out a couple of light spots in the BG, + standard processing.

Hope you like it. Comments of course welcome. I'll post the female in a few days.

Canon EOS 50D, 500mm f4
capture date: Sunday, 2 August 2009, 10:22 AM
exposure program: Aperture Priority
ISO speed: 400
shutter speed: 1/400
aperture: f7.1
exposure bias: +1.0
metering: Pattern
flash: OFF

[Randy Stout]

John:

Very nice in all regards. sharp, well exposed, nice pose,BG.

I really do think the old adage : "The harder I work, the luckier I get", is true in photography. Obviously there is luck involved in many of our shots. Being at the right place, at the right time takes fore planning and thought, but ultimately, if the bird doesn't show up, the light is cruddy, etc., you are "out of luck"

We can improve the odds greatly by working at it, knowing what to do when the moment arrives, etc., but even the best get skunked sometimes.

Randy

[Raymond Barlow]

I agree with Randy, luck is a factor., like is most sports,. sometimes things just bounce your way, and other times, we are SOL.

But luck didn't get this cool shot, you made it happen John, well done.

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Nice image. These guys move a lot. loved the head turn. Did you try setting contrast to -1 during raw conversion? At times, that is a good answer to harsh light.

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

Lovely pose and pin sharp where it counts! As hard as we work, luck is still an essential and underrated component of nature photography. :) Congrats Sir!

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the pose, sharpness and BG and might crop a tad off the top. Have you installed the new firmware before photographing this bird? I'm wondering because there seems to be a magenta cast that the new firmware supposedly fixes.

[John Chardine]

Axel- I did install it but maybe not before this image. I noticed some magenta cast as well and turned it back with Ps Color balance, but I guess I didn't turn back enough.

[Kiran Poonacha]

Its a beautiful Bird and a well made Image.. all other points cover above.. about the luck part, you just have to be there first and with patience your time will come... Congrats..

[Subharghya]

By Luck or not you have made a Beautiful Image :) .. The light is definitely a bit harsh but I feel if we can enjoy the scene with our eyes then we surely can make an equally enjoyable image by our camera and I feel this image is proving me right :) .. One more thing I feel about Luck is I don't have enough of it then it will be a good idea to hang around with somebody who has lots of it :D :D

About Processing of this image I feel you could have reduced the exposure a bit - may be 1/2 stop in PS so the perch and overall brightness tone down a bit .. Just my two cents :)