Bald Eagle with Captured Crow

[Bill Jobes]

I observed this bald eagle last spring in Maryland, flying to the nest tree with a captured live crow in its talons.
The crow was destined to become a meal for two pre-fledge eaglets.
While acknowledging the artistic shortcomings of the image, I offer it for interest in the dramatic value of the moment.

Mark II 1Dn
1/8000
F 5.6
ISO 640
Canon 500 F/4

C & C encouraged and appreciated as always.

[Ken Watkins]

Your offer is greatfully accepted, sometimes the shot is worth looking at even if it is not technicaly superb.

[Doug Brown]

Like it a lot Bill! As Jim Fenton said in another thread, a photo doesn't have to be entirely optimal to be worthwhile. That said, I think you can pull a little more detail out of the blacks, and I might remove the piece of tree trunk overlapping the wing on the left. Thanks for posting!

[Daniel Cadieux]

Looks like the blacks were oroginally quite underexposed and recovered to the point of introducing colour noise, and the top of the head gets lost in the sky.

Your image does nicely showcase the strenght of the eagle, looks quite effortless on his part!

[Arthur Morris]

Agree with Daniel as there is tons of color noise in the blacks. Action rating: A+. Image Quality: D. I could not, however resist a repost. Removed some of the magenta and green, added a bit of black to the blacks, and got rid of all of the branches.

[Bill Jobes]

Great comments and critiques ... thanks much to all!
I like what you did Artie! What an improvement to dramatize the pose.
Your grade evaluation was right on target as well.
The underexposure probably resulted from my AV setting, and with partial metering probably missing the bird itself, it reacted to the sky and pushed to shutter speed to 1/8000!
My BIF tracking technique has improved a bit in the past year. :D

[Arthur Morris]

The underexposure probably resulted from my AV setting, and with partial metering probably missing the bird itself, it reacted to the sky and pushed to shutter speed to 1/8000!

Here is a simple trick for photographing birds in flight against the sky in less than sunny conditions. Meter off the sky and add lots of light, from 1 to 3 stops depending on the camera and how white the sky is. Check (and then adjust if need be) the histogram so that the sky is well into the fifth box. Now simply set that exposure manually and you are good to go.