Black skimmer over colony with fish

[Grace Scalzo]

A few days ago, I posted an image of a black skimmer coming in for a landing over the gathering of birds and received some excellent suggestions for improvement. This is a scene that I have had in my head for a while and have yet to 100% accomplish it. Marina helped with a suggestion on composition, and Diane had a great idea on how to deal with the birds on the beach which are important, but not the main subject. This version is nearly full frame. I reduced contrast slightly on the bottom birds. (per Dianne's sugggestion). I try not to say much about my images before you weigh in, but I do wish that we could see the fish's head...just a bit of bad luck, but I'm not going to delete this one just because of that .

Thanks in advance for your ideas.

1/1600, f 5.6, iso800
Canon 1dx, 600 f4 + lowered rrs tripod

[Martin Dunn]

Grace,that is a lovely photo.
The light is gorgeous and you have captured the skimmer in terrific detail.
It took me a moment to realise that the strange OOF blobs at the bottom were more birds but I think that you have dealt with something that you couldn't really exclude from the image in a good way.
If you had it I would love a little more space on the left side for the skimmer to fly into. Well done.

[Bill Dix]

Hi Grace. Beautiful light, as with all your images. The flight position is just right, and the fish a bonus, eyes or not. I think the resting oof skimmers add interest. My only wish would be for the bird to be a little further right in the frame, but if this is FF that could be tricky.

[gail bisson]

Man, you are a good photographer! You always have great light and good composition ( although this time I do wish for a tiny bit more on the right!).
Tack sharp with great incoming pose. Fish is a bonus.
Love the layered BG colors as well.
If this was mine (and I wish it was), I would burn the white areas on the right side to match the ones on the left,
Gail

[Markus Jais]

Great shot. I like the low angle, the fish, the wing pose and the birds in the background. Light is beautiful.

Markus

[James Salywoda]

Fantastic Image Grace!!!!

[arash_hazeghi]

excellent pose, details, light and techs.

This should serve as a good example where OOF birds in the BG work because they are 1) nicely blurred with a high quality bokeh and 2) the species are still distinguishable and thus show the colony. it would not work if they were sharper (distracting) or more blurry (indistinguishable). Kodus for getting it right.

the only thing I might wish was a bit more separation but it is fine as is

TFS

[dankearl]

You continually excel at producing Birds as real life art.
Amazing flight image with enough habitat detail that the viewer imagines the rest....

[Robert Kimbrell]

Beautiful image Grace. Really nice light. What makes the photo for me is the birds in the background, a beautiful blur, but still able to recognize them as skimmers.

[hennieloots]

Gorgeous image Grace. Lovely light and great details on the skimmer. I like the wing position and the fish is just a bonus. I too think the OOf birds work well. Ditto on a bit more space, but not a biggy.
TFS
Hennie

[MohsenVahedipour]

Excellent flight pose with great IQ, light & BG. I like the food item & oof birds in the BG. TFS

[Richard Flack]

Another awesome image Grace. Well done! Love the fish and the eye contact especially.

[Sidharth Kodikal]

Killer light, great bird angle and perfect exposure. The fish takes this over the top. Nice work, Grace.