Juvenile waiting for dinner

This juvenile great horned owl (and a sibling) came down low to the ground just before sunset waiting for mom to bring dinner. They are two young owls from a pair of owls that have nested in an observation tower at the ranger station at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge for several years. He was on a wall about three feet off of the ground. There was only a sliver of the sun remaining on the horizon. The only way I could get the sun shining in his eye was to take a close up, I could not see the rest of him from that position.

It may be a little dark, but I hope it is ok and I do wish for more DOF. Perhaps I should have upped the ISO!

Nikon D3S, 500mm f4 plus 1.7 converter for 850mm
ISO 1250, f7.1, 1/60 sec
Manual Exposure

Hi,

Exposure and d.o.f. Look fine to me. I looked long and hard to decide whether, given the straight-on look, the bird would look better centered, and whether the balance of the image was too clustered to the right, but I decided I like it as it is, with a somewhat off-beat look. Sun shining in the eye is neat.

Richard

Beautiful portrait. It is interesting to se how the light changes the colour of the eyes.

I like this a lot, Laurie.
It is not too dark for me, very nice IQ, BG, and the Owl looks terrific.
A very nice setting for this guy.

Lovely portrait of a beautiful owl,Laurie.Slightly higher DOF would have helped, but IQ is great as is.Would go for a more central comp,personally.

Fabulous portrait of beautiful Owl.Love the beautiful eyes with nice lights and colors.

Excellent close up shot. Very nice background, great details, love the light, and great comp.
Well done.

very nice image,like the light in the eye,good detail.thanks.

Lovely. The light quality is excellent. There are some real nice transitions in color and tone
in the background. There is a bit of what I presume to be the "wall" still visible, mostly on the
left hand side bottom of the frame, that would look better cropped out.

Love those yes, what a great character shot....looks like a relative of Oscar the Grouch, not sure about the dead space on the left, and needs trim off the bottom

Sweet, loveable, stands apart from what is typically seen. Yes indeed, rid yourself of that pesky clumpline at bottom!

Hi Laurie, good eye contact, and good detail and sharpness for such a slow ss. Difficult to get both eyes the same due to the angle of the light at that moment, but cant help thinking trying to lighten the owls right eye may work, ( if you havent aready tried :w3 )

A central placement will work, but having said that the foliage on the RHS may unbalance the BG.

Thank you all for your comments. I will crop a little off of the bottom to eliminate the wall.

Stuart - I did nothing to the eyes, thanks for the suggestion, I will try it.