I went to Circle B Bar Reserve this morning but nothing happening there, so I headed for Lake Mirror in Lakeland, Florida before I lost early morning light. At Lake Mirror I found a pair of Mandarin ducks on a ledge just above the water level (Lake Mirror is a center city lake surrounded by a concrete promenade with sets of concrete stairs leading to the water). I slowly moved down the steps, sitting on a lower step near the pair of ducks. At first the male was spooky but soon he began to groom and preen indicating he was comfortable with my presence. I then went to work capturing many images, this is one of them. Comments and critique welcomed and appreciated. Thank you for viewing.
Nikon D7000
Nikon 80-400mm F/4.5-5.6 VRII AF-S ED shot at 310mm (465mm FFE)
1/320 F/7.1 Matrix Metering +1 1/3 EV ISO 1600 AWB, camera supported and braced by knee pods, bird was in the shade with the water surface in the sun, continuous autofocus, single point, the active point was one above the center where the crown of the head above the birds bill meets the water background
Post processed in Lightroom CC and Photoshop CC
Cropped for composition and presentation
Last edited by Joseph Przybyla; 09-10-2016 at 03:58 PM.
Joe Przybyla
"Sometimes I do get to places just as God is ready to have somebody click the shutter"... Ansel Adams
Mandarin Duck (drake)
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