Red-capped Plover

[Glenn Pure]

This bird is found around Australia at both salt and fresh water sites. This one was taken in a coastal area (the Carlo Sandblow) at Rainbow Beach in Queensland, just below Fraser Island. I was wondering why this bird was loitering close by. Without thinking about it much more, I laid down for this low angle shot and moments later, after getting some shots, the bird moved less than an metre from me and sat on its eggs! I didn't even see them and lucky I didn't stand on them. I cleared out as soon as I realised. Unfortunately, it had chosen a spot where quite a few people walk so I hope the nest survived. I've taken a bit off all round for this composition and it is about 3/4 of the frame area.

Technical: Canon 80D with EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM at 400mm handheld. Manual exposure 1/3200 sec, f7.1, ISO 400. Processed in Canon DPP 4 (digital lens optimiser @ 50, sharpness = 3, crop, lighting adjustments, NR) then exported 16 bit TIFF to Photoshop Elements with Neat Image NR plugin. Modest NR applied to bird and stronger to background. Bird sharpened in PSE (Sharpness tool, remove Gaussian Blur: 0.4 pixels at 50%) after final size reduction.

[Tim Foltz]

Glenn, No nits from me, love the shot. Super details, exposure, comp and colors. Very nice.

-Tim

[David Seymour]

Excellent shot Glenn, probably the best I've seen of this small beach-dwelling species. This looks like a male, but possibly without full development of the head colour? It's a great composition with just the right plane and depth of focus, and beautiful overall tones. I like the slight impression that the bird is standing in a small pebble avalanche! I know what you mean about the dangers of trying to photograph beach dwellers like this in breeding season - you have to juggle looking at/for the birds with looking at your feet every step of the way, in fact before every step of the way, and also watching for protective bird behaviour. As you did, always best to clear out if you realise there is a nest nearby. At least on some Australian beaches these days there are temporary no-go areas roped off in an attempt to protect the main nesting areas from human trampling in breeding season - but there are always some birds which unwittingly choose an extremely vulnerable location for their nest, which is a worry.

Cheers, David

[Jonathan Ashton]

Never seen one before, what a little beauty wonderful colours and details, very nice indeed. Usually I would not recommend removing the pebbles as I regard them as natural, cleaned up beaches can look a bit sterile to me. Having said that I am not a fan of the larger pebble beneath the tail where the sand is in focus, I think it competes for attention a little too much.

[Bill Dix]

Beautiful bird that's new to me. Nicely exposed with a good pose. The in-focus zone of sand almost makes it look like some rotation is necessary, but I guess the bird is standing on a slope. The pebbles don't overly bother me, but the dark like (shadow?) behind the legs is a little distracting.

[keith mitchell]

Glenn I think you have made a beautiful job of the lovely little wader,and all done in that very bright light you have ,can understand the shadows,excellent.

Keith.

[William Dickson]

Very nice indeed. I reckon you got it spot on here Glenn. The pose, the detail, the BG, the DOF, the habitat, works together real good here. Well done. I love the chestnut colours on the head.

Will

[Glenn Pure]

Thank you all for your comments and suggestions. These days, I'm very reluctant to do much cloning. I like to show the environment as it was, with imperfections. But I note some comments that a little clean-up could give this more visual impact. Yes, the sand had quite a slope and dropped over a small cliff not far from where this was taken. This bird was alone - nothing else seen on this vast sandblow. The bird did not provide any other alerts to its nest nearby either, eg feigned broken wing or aggression. Perhaps it was simply getting used to having lots of people around. In full breeding plumage, these birds have an entire chestnut crown.

[Arthur Morris]

You did well considering what had to be rather harsh overhead light.

with love, artie