Virginia Rail Portrait

[Wayne Wood]

I created this image Sunday morning while sitting at the edge of a marsh 5 minutes from home. I heard this guy calling and put my audio on and he immediately came right in running across my outstretched legs. I took about 15 shots of him then turned off the audio and went on my way. Canon 20D w/ 200 F/2.8L, F/5.6 @ 1/250 sec, ISO 200, manual exposure at + 1/3 EC. Your comments and critique are most welcome.

[Randy Stout]

Wayne:

Sharp, nice head angle, really nice detail in the bill/mouth area. Well exposed.
If your ethics allow, I might burn in the light stem that intersects with his bill.

Thanks for sharing.

Randy

[Arthur Morris]

Love the sharpness, the rich colors, and the open bill. The five or six distinct grass or other stems in the BKGR are distracting. The winning move here might have been to have gotten much lower as that would likely have effectively moved the BKGR elements farther from the subject (thus rendering them more o-o-f.)

The HA is good but not perfect. A bit more towards you would have been a bit better.

[Kobus Tollig]

Ditto all the comments. Still well done on a good one

[Wayne Wood]

Thanks for the comments and suggestions, I will try and rework the image and clean up the back ground later tonight at home

[Randy Stout]

Wayne:

My guess is that if you were already sitting down, and the bird walked over your legs, you weren't going to be able to get much lower on this one?

Randy