Barn Owl.

[keith mitchell]

Nikon D4
Nikon 300mm 2.8
1/125@F6.3
ISO 2000.

Low light job but I like the feel of it.


Thanks for taking a look.

[Glennie Passier]

Hi Keith, I really like the low light and the "feel" of the image. It's very painterly. I know the purists among us will not overly like his perch, but I would think this would be a typical barn owl perch. I love his pose. It seems like you may have been struggling with noise?

Thank you for sharing!

[Daniel Cadieux]

I agree with the "painterly" comment above. Neat pose, and I like the dark BG (although I would attempt to remove the faintly visible elements within it, especially above the owl's head and in ULC). I would have preferred an old weathered fence, but you had what you had.

[Randy Stout]

Keith:

I like the pose, composition, nice display of the facial disc. Agree about the perch, but it is a BARN owl, so they don't always perch on photographer friendly spots.

You were in pretty close to this one based on your focal length. Were you in a blind/hyde?

Cheers

Randy

[keith mitchell]

Thanks Glennie and Dan, was never going to get just what I wanted with the poor light(and my lack of knowledge to deal with it) and the featureless door but as you say you take what you can get, hope they are there this year .Randy you are right slowly moved my hide into place over a couple of weeks then was able to get shots of up to 4 Owls even if the IQ is below where I would have liked it, with a better understanding of the site and ac little more knowledge of my camera we will see this year hopefully.

Thanks Keith.

[Glennie Passier]

Keith, slowly but surely wins the race. You are so dedicated to the craft. Are you able to put some nice old weathered fence posts there somewhere? I have trained my butcher birds to sit on just about anything I ask them to, to the point of boredom. I know you are going to nail these guys!

[Steve Kaluski]

Greeting Keith from BC, lovely image, would echo the above comments, looking forward to more later in the year.

TFS
Steve

[Joseph Przybyla]

What a treasure, such a beautiful owl. I have yet to photograph a Barn Owl, definitely on my bucket list. Thank you for sharing, Keith.

[keith mitchell]

Thanks for your kind words Glennie will keep at it, thanks also to Steve and Joe much appreciated.

Keith.

[Loi Nguyen]

Excellent image. The near dark background isolates the owl well. I like the composition and the half turn face. Well done. Loi

[christopher galeski]

nice capture Keith,like the pose,not keen on the perch,but it is what it is.TFS.

[keith mitchell]

Thanks Loi and Chris much appreciated.

[Satish Ranadive]

Excellent image.

Regards,
Satish.

[keith mitchell]

Thank you Satish much appreciated.

Keith.

[Arthur Morris]

Hey Keith,
Assuming that the site is at an abandoned dwelling, consider putting a nice facing on the plain perch when the birds are not in residence; there are lots of possibilities all including the words character and weathered...

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[keith mitchell]

Thanks Arthur this is a fairly new building that we fitted up with a nest box that as worked very well ,but not the best place for photography. Been off my legs for a while but planning to go back and see what we can do to make thing better.
Question I would like to ask is the IQ really bad? I ask this because conditions at the time where very hard for me to handle.

Keith.

[Arthur Morris]

Hey Keith, Would that be a new unoccupied building???

Though the bird looks a bit on the too smooth side IQ looks acceptable to me; I think that you did pretty well in what I assume were extreme low light conditions.

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[keith mitchell]

Thanks Arthur for the IQ bit I have lots of shots of these birds even four together but could not make up my mind if they are good enough to post on the forum.
The buildings where almost rebuilt out buildings on a property that a friend of mine renovated. Was really pleased they looked after the Owls by putting up the box, nesting sites for Barn owls are getting very scarce in my part of Lincolnshire so spending a bit of my retirement time making and installing boxes which is being very successful .Thanks for your interest .

Keith.

[Arthur Morris]

Keith you are welcome but I am still confused as to the buildings; will the nest boxes be in place and open to the air once the building are finished and occupied? Is an outbuilding and outdoor bathroom?

[keith mitchell]

Sorry Arthur I will try to explain the situation better. It is a bit of a trend now to buy up derelict farm buildings and what we call outhouses, These outhouses can be detached from the main old farm house or sometimes fixed to the side of the house and were used as store houses or for farm animals or stables, they are built from bricks and have clay tiled roofs. The ones we have put the Owl boxes in were very bad and had to be almost rebuilt but planning laws insist that they are put back close to their original state, these are situated about a 100 yards from the main house which was also in a very bad state of repair but now even though the outside looks very much like the original the inside is very modern and swish. The box is in the renovated outbuilding and the first point of exit is onto these new doors ,on the up side Ivy is starting to grow over the door and the owner is happy to leave this which will help to give a more natural look.
Hope all is well with you.
Regards Keith

[Arthur Morris]

Thanks for the explanation. As these building are apparently unused my original suggestion might work: erect a simple natural facade over the rather ugly perch at some point when the birds are not nesting or roosting there. It could be as simple as a weathered log with a slot cut in the bottom and affixed to the siding or whatever it is :) In other words, why not go natural all the way?

Another option would simply be some nice natural looking weathered siding from another site nailed in place and just a bit higher than the current perch.

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