Landing Gear Down

Another young silver gull at close range. So close, I couldn't fit him all in the frame. Not lured, but I was sitting in the right spot where the little freshwater fish were floundering. He has some fish guts on his mouth that I decided to leave.

I wished the wings were intact, but decided to see how other folk like, or not like the clipped wings.

In ACR - Shadows moved to the right, Whites to the right.
In PSCS6 - Nik dfine over image. Smart sharpened for posting.

5D2
Canon 70-200mm @ 135mm (I think he was about to land on me)
f8 @ 1/2500 sec
ISO 500
Hand Held

C&C welcomed and appreciated!

It's a great shot, with nice details and DOF, nice BG but I do wish the rest of the wings were in the frame.

Good catch, Glennie! And very nice processing. I actually love the eye in this picture. Do you really need Nik Dfine for this image, Glennie? I mean you shot this at ISO500. I usually don't run through NR software unless needed so I am curious.

I am not sure if this answers your wing question but it's on the too-big-in-the-frame side; at least for my taste. I think you have some really nice landscape there that I am wishing the bird to be part of the scene.

Glennie I like the way you've captured both a full-in-the-frame image here, with perfect focus on face/eyes/body, and still been able to show the distant landscape with enough focus to be recognizable with the separate elements of beach/ocean/sandbars/cliff/trees/sky distinguishable. While it's nice to get the wingtips, sometimes you don't and personally I would never sacrifice such a striking shot to the delete button for only that reason<script type="text/javascript" src="safari-extension://com.ebay.safari.myebaymanager-QYHMMGCMJR/4dc7e2e0/background/helpers/prefilterHelper.js"></script>

Now that I look at it again, I have to retract my previous statement of it being too big in the frame. Especially when I think about how it was gonna land on you. The picture really grows on me, Glennie.

Agree with the above -- beautiful shot and excellent to get good focus as he flies toward you! I'm 50-50 about the wings but lean toward wanting to see the whole gull against the very nice BG.

In an ideal world you can steady the camera with one hand on the zoom ring in order to frame an oncoming subject, but maybe this was just a one-time occurrence and you hadn't anticipated it. AF should be able to keep up with zooming with no problem. Don't know how you hold the camera but the proper way is with the palm under the lens, reasonably far out. I'm too lazy to go downstairs and dig out the 70-200 but the key would be a grip that lets you zoom on the fly without getting on the focus ring.

Not by any means suggesting you might do this, but I always try to bring up points to a more general audience. Holding a camera with the thumb under the lens (generally seen close in to the body) is like riding a bike with your arch centered over the pedals instead of the forefoot. People in the know will know... :e3

Thank you all! I am still 50-50 on the tipless wings. But, as Bob mentioned...I liked the shot too much to delete it. Maybe something to practice wing building on?

Diane, I need to practice dexterity. Old hands don't work as fast as they used to. But I do try. I do ride a nice bike though, and once, even better horses, so know that you have to ride with your forefeet. :S3:

Cool on the riding -- both steeds! Then zooming while following a bird will be easily mastered!

Definitely not a deletion here! Not every image has to conform to one ideal pose, frame placement and IQ...

Nice close up landing action. Pity about the wing tips. Everything else about the image is really good - bird in its environment as well. It is worth keeping.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Personally, I really like filling the frame with a subject, so I am quite happy with this photograph.
When birds spread their wings coming towards you and you also want good detail on the body, something has to give.
In my opinion, if you got a great (in-flight!) pose and pleasing background, it's okay to sometimes lose those wing-tips. And you got both of that here.
The title is also fitting, it really looks like a large airplane coming in to land. :S3:

Thank you for sharing, kind regards,

Robert