Eastern Screech Owl.

[Daniel Cadieux]

This fella was sleeping most of the time, but being at the right place at the right time (or in other words, lucky) I was able to see it wake up for a quick preen and scratch session before dosing off again. This is a stare it offered me just as it finished preening...

Canon 7D + 500mm f/4 II + 1.4TC, manual exposure, evaluative metering, 1/100s., f/5.6, ISO 800, natural light, handheld (sitting down and lens braced on a knee), small crop for comp, a distracting twig removed from just above the head, and a few sunshine highlights removed from the tree in upper left corner. Lightened the eyes. A very nasty blue cast also tamed.

[Karl Egressy]

Daniel,
Great to find one out of the nesting hole. Excellent image, like the wide open eyes.

[Marina Scarr]

Great looking screech and portrait. I am really liking the vegetation and how it helps to frame the owl.

[Randy Stout]

Daniel:

What a set of peepers he has! Very soft feeling, agree about the almost graphic arts effect of the framing leaves, nice.

Effective shooting angle.

Cheers

Randy

[Ramon Reyes]

Nice looking fella, love those eyes. Well done Daniel.

Ramon

[Fernando Cerra]

Daniel, this is very clear and crisp image, great looking owl

[Mark Dumbleton]

Great looking image! Very compelling eye's. I like the leaves adding interest to the image!

[keith mitchell]

Very much like the way the leaves add lots of interest to this Daniel, the Owl itself with those great big eyes is super.

Keith.

[William Dickson]

Very nice image Dan, great details and light throughout. Love the lightness in the BG. Great work.

Will

[Raymond Barlow]

Superb image Daniel., really an amazing wildlife shot. Awesome! After several looks, I cannot make any sort of suggestion., besides - bring your tripod and gimble head next time! f8 would have been sweet!

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

Nice shot Daniel. It looks as if you were shooting up just a bit, for me I think less room above and more below would look a bit more appealing in that case.
I don't mind the broken perch either as it has weathered nicely.
Good work on it.