Snowy Owl

[John Harper]

Hi There

We had a significant amount of snowfall in the South of the UK yesterday for the 1st time in nearly 20 years, and I was able to gain access to my usual venue of the Hawk Conservancy to see if they would let me shoot some pictures of "Sweeny Todd" the juvenile snowy Owl in his natural weather conditions.

Well they said yes, and it turned into a very special day...

Hope you like it

John H

EOS 1DMKIII EF 500 F4 ISO 800 1/1250 @ F5.6

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I'm glad they let you photograph this beautiful bird and you seized the opportunity really well. I like the incoming pose and the eye contact. The snow adds to it but the wing position with a bit of motion blur puts it over the top for me. It might work as pano crop, too.

[Doug Hitchcox]

Like Axel said, this image is over the top. Love it! Any thought of giving it ~5° CCW rotation for better symmetry? Just a thought, its amazing as is

[John Harper]

Hi Doug - Axel

Thanks for looking and I took on board both of your suggestions, and tried a rotated pano crop.

I think it works OK

John

[Bob Malbon]

John,Sweet result on the re-work! Bob

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the repost and think both versions look great.

[Dean Ingwersen]

Just awesome John. Love the pose and the snow, but that hint of movement in the wingtips is great. Love both versions.

[paul leverington]

I strongly favor the original angle. Horizontals and verticals are less interesting than diagonals, generally. Don't blame me I didn't make the rule. The thing that bothers me is that the contrast seems too high. The bg is too dark for what I'm used to seeing for a snow filled sky day. That being said, it would be true that I have no idea what the bg stuff is, but snowy day scenes I've never seen with so much contrast as this shot. The owl too looks too contrasty. A tail would have been nice -but no control over that. Nits over--This shot for me is refreshing and extremely powerful. If it were mine it would be in my top Ten!

Paul

*perfect shooting nos by the way for this kind of bird in snow conditions. I use the same exact ones.

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

I am with Paul re angle. I think the original looks magical in comparison with the perfect levelled repost. I do like the added contrast and perhaps a contrast in between the original and repost would be ideal? Very neat! :)