Killdeer

[Grace Scalzo]

From this past weekend. This is the male of a pair that has chicks. My plan was to lay down and see if they would come close. Took three shots then left as the male ran over to me and began his broken wing display. Some other day. They have enough perils without the distraction of a photographer.

1/2500, f 5.6, ISO800
Canon 1Dmk4, 500 f4 + 1.4tc + upside down blubb for support.

[Jim Crosswell]

A real beauty Grace! I like the angled pose, sharpness, exposure and soft pastel setting.

[Jack Breakfast]

The trick broken wing display will break hearts, believe it! I didn't know about this marvelous behavior and on one sad occasion tortured a poor killdeer who I thought was just "being silly" but of course that was years ago before I learned the ways of that stupidly-named but lovely-looking bird. And of course it's not the bird's fault if some bozo gave him a dumb name. Chickadees, anyone? Moving on, this is a beautiful picture, Grace! Lovely soft colors in the background and so forth. I saw a killdeer nest this morning, as a matter of interest. At my local migrant-stopover park. The construction men thought to put four orange pylons around the thing. It was uncanny: the nervous killdeer sitting on eggs on the ground, four orange pylons marking the perimeter, and many idiotic humans with their floppy dogs getting real close and saying things like "Jeez you can see the eggs! Man, that bird's really freakin!"

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Grace, well your lying down certainly created a great low perspective, and I like the angle of the Kildeer too. I like the DOF effect, soft light and the colours of the distant OOF BG. The Killdeer is probably sitting in the bottom ROT's, but I would still maybe take a touch off the top. :w3

[Daniel Cadieux]

Beautiful image, Grace...I love everything about it. I like the comp as is, and I like the play between the FG and BG. That blue area at top is very nice!

[dankearl]

The painterly feel to the FG is very nice. Looks like the bird is walking out of the mist.
Very nice.

[Dumay de Boulle]

I love the space and shoting angle. Very nice image Grace!

[christopher galeski]

nice dream typ scene,you can see in the birds face,what are you up to,nice one.

[thijs broekkamp]

Great shot, love the low angle and the out of focus foreground. Also like the space around the bird

[Stan Cunningham]

Great shooting angle, and I love the blue in upper right as well.

[Joe Senzatimore]

One sweet image. The comp and low angle are perfect. The beautiful BG ain't bad either.

[Cheryl Arena Molennor]

Great low angle Grace. It always creates such a softness that I just love. Shame the babies didn't come but you did get a nice shot here. I really like your crop.