Snowy Owl Attack

[Jamie Douglas]

I didn't see this guy come swooping in straight towards me while I was busy photographing two snowy owls that were perched on a pile of rotting shore grass. This owl had spotted a big rat that I must have disturbed and came straight for me. I had zero time to react and change my settings so just had to point and fire off the trigger in the hope of getting something special. A split second after this the owl had grabbed the rat and was away again.

I always strive to come up with something different and all too often with nature these moments come out of nowhere and force you to react very quickly.

Techs... Canon 7D with 400mm F5.6 @ F8, ISO400, 1/60, Exp comp +1

Read about my weekend with the snowy owls here: <!-- m -->http://jmdouglasphotography.blogspot.com/

[Don Nelson]

Interesting use of a pan keeping the face/head from blurring. Too bad you weren't able to go to a higher ASA and keep the bird sharp. I wish the eyes were focused on you rather than the rat off to your right.

[Stu Bowie]

Jamie, we have all missed shots due to other circumstances, but its still a bummer when you know with perfect techs, you would have come away with a winning image. I do like the attentive stare of the owl's eye's on his prey, and overall well exposed on the whites.

[Steve Kaluski]

Hey Jamie, nice to hear they are back.

As Stu said, we have all been there and missed the shot, or managed to clip the wing etc, however under the circumstances you did well. Look forward to more, but would look at cranking up the ISO for better SS.

Trust they will be around Feb/March. :bg3:

TFS
Steve

[gail bisson]

Enjoyed reading your blog and am green with envy at you seeing all those snowy's. I kinda like this shot and I don't usually like blurs. The face is sharp and the wing blur ok. I just really miss the wing tips!!
Gail

[Dave Leroy]

A cool experience Jamie. Now that you know which perch they prefer a really nice flight shot is waiting for you. If an eagle flies over they will all take off and start returning in 10 or 15 minutes. A very nice pose on this one. I like the nicely spread tail.

[Robert Holguin]

A very nice shot. I really like the blur here, head and eyes are sharp, and whites are exposed well.
Well done.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Sometimes with surprises like this its just best to click and hope:S3: I too like the ffect here, interesting blur for sure. I'd crop in just a bit more from the left to make it look more like an intentional cut rather than an accidental clip. Not a huge fan of the LRC, but all-in-all a nice "grab shot" that turned out pleasantly enough....

[Jamie Douglas]

Thanks everyone. While a bit of me wishes I was more prepared for this shot I do like the result. I totally did not expect a snowy to come in that close to me because they are usually failry cautious of people when you get within close proximity of them.

Don,thank you, as much as I like eye contact I do prefer when the subject isn't engaged directly with me.

Gail, glad you liked my blog. Thank you.

Robert, appreciate you comments, thanks.

Stuart, you should see the OOF shots. They still make wanna scream almost a week later. As soon as the snowy took off with the rat I had to look at the LCD and was pretty darn happy to see that the eyes were sharp. I was so taken by suprise when it came in that I knocked the ISO down to 400 instead of up to 800. I was at 640 for the portrait shots I was taking.

Dave: I plan to make a few more trips down before they leave so I hope to come away with something better than my SEO photo from last year: http://jamiedouglas.zenfolio.com/p518489142/h3a0477d2#h3a0477d2 your ex 400mm makes a killer combo with the 7D.

Daniel, the LRC annoys me and I had to crop the full frame a touch to remove part of the log. I will definetly take on board your crop idea and see how it looks. Thanks.

Steve, I have sent you a PM.

Thanks again folks :5

Jamie

[Cheryl Arena Molennor]

I like it and don't mind the blur at all. It adds to the movement IMO and the head and eyes are nice and sharp.. I actually don't really mind the clipped wings either since they almost kind of blend in and dissapear into the bg anyway.

[arash_hazeghi]

I actually like the blur here, the intense sharp eyes anchor the image for the viewer nicely while the sense of motion plus the habitat all work for this nice work. however I find the clipped wings a bit distracting...if the full wings were there this image would have been over the top for me :)