White-backed Vulture at carcass

Attachment 83145

Taken in Kruger Park at a Giraffe carcass. Vultures at a carcass allways present good opportunities with all the squabling, hissing and posturing going on, also for flight shots with all the coming and going. Unfortunately light was dull with intermittent drizzle so no flight shots.HA not the best but suits the posture I think.

30D/EF500f4/f8 @ 1/100/iso640. About 90% FF blur on background, added a little canvas on top for composition and removed partial bird in LRC.

C&C most welcome.

Wonderful tonality Pieter! Love the image and all I would love is a bit more space around. Just a little tight for me that's all. Well done mate! :)

The vulture looks intent on his meal. I like the tones of brown and is a great behaviour image. Well done Pieter!

Pieter,

I love the menacing look on the vultures face and the hanging head. Akos is right on about the color tone as it is very nice and subtle here. The scalloped feathers on the fore wing are well captured also. Finally, the fact that you have a giraffe carcass in your image is a feat unto itself as I've never seen that before. Thanks.

DB

This is an inspiring image, Pieter. The drizzle was your friend, for even though it took away the possibility of flight shots for you, it subdued the light, giving you the good tonality that Akos noted. Your work in Photoshop was good; I'd have never known there was a bird in the LRC. (I don't, however, understand exactly what you meant about adding canvas up top. The left wing of the vulture is already nearly scraping the top, and surely you captured the entire bird.) I enjoy the raised left foot, and the lack of eye contact is no problem for me, because it's obvious what the hungry vulture was interested in, and it certainly wasn't you. Finally, there's just enough giraffe in the shot to make it clear what your vulture's preying on, but not so much that you end up telling the story of a dead giraffe and not a living vulture. The Grim Reaper has arrived.

Hi Pieter, good detail on the vulture, especially around the head and beak. A typical posture from a vulture, as Craig mentioned the grim reaper perched on a headstone in a graveyard. I agree this is a tad tight, top and right. Easily done to extend the canvas, as the BG is uniform.

Awesome!!! This is such a gorgeous image Pieter great pose and I love the surrounding habitat... Well Done!

Thanks everyone for your comments, much appreciated. I agree it needs more room which is something I must get used to again. :o A lot of my images were sent to a on-line field guide where the crop requirement is a lot tighter.

Craig the top of the original frame just touched the top of the left wing and I added canvas to provide that small bit of room.