Pelican bathing

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Pelicanus philippensis.

Canon EOS 1D Mark II, EF 400mm f2.8 L IS USM, EF 2xII, ISO 800, f8, 1/4000, fullframe.

Look forward to your comments and critiques.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[Betsie Storm]

Sabyasachi , beautiful action and water droplets plus splashing make this image, well seen and captured. Looks like the pelican is enjoying his bath! Personally I might have blurred the top dark vegetation some more.

[Stu Bowie]

Sabya, I have never witnessed this behaviour from a Pelican before. Good use of ss to freeze the bathing action. Although there are plenty of droplets flying around, moving him slightly to the right in the frame, would not lose the effect of the action.

[David Thomasson]

Nice job "freezing" the water droplets. A couple of curves adjustment layers -- one to brighten the subject a little, another to darken
the background and foreground a bit. Also used Threshold to make a mask and enhance the water drop above the bird a little.

http://img42.imageshack.us/img42/6619/bathd.jpg

[Tony Whitehead]

Interesting behaviour captured, Sabyasachi. Stu's crop suggestion is worth exploring and I agree that this could be brightened up a little. I love the water spraying from the feathers.

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Hi Betsie, Stuart, Tony,
I appreciate your comments. This is the first time I saw such behaviour. The pelican was beating the water with its wings like a kid splashing in a bath tub. It was twisting and turning and once even flapped its wings like a duck. It was fun.

David,
Thanks for the repost. It looks better.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[David Thomasson]

Found a short video clip (http://share.ovi.com/media/suinmarin.public/suinmarin.10470) of this behavior.