Alarming Greater black-backed Gull

[Krijn Trimbos]

Not the most action packed shot I have made in Ireland but I liked it a lot nonetheless. I had always wanted a nice shot of this Gull species and fortunatly there was a breeding colony on the Island. Every day we had to walk past the border of this breeding colony and every once in a while the parents would start alarming. This was taken at such a moment.

People will probably suggest to take some of the left and add some to the top, I tried it but I liked it this way..............curious what you think

Canon EOS 50D 1/2000 f4
ISO 640
Canon 300mm F2.8 L USM
Handheld

[Gal Shon]

the left and add some to the top

I'll add some to the right
The perch / rocks, the yellow lichen (wow), BG and open beak makes this one stand out, fantastic shot.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Yes, I would probably crop a little bit at left - but not much. Lovely colours and pose, nice subtle head turn just to let us know that the alarmimg is directed towards you :-) I like that you left some room at bottom for the grass tufts between the rocks. Good exposure control.

[Markus Jais]

I like it the way it is. Wonderful light and colors. I like the head turn and the open bill. Fantastic bird. It's sad that many people don't like gulls very much.

Markus

[Ilija Dukovski]

Great looking bird,
the crop is unusual but the birds pose is such that
it is OK I think.
Very cool rocks...

[Jasper Doest]

Hey buddy....lovely colors and I love the SH! Knowing about the colornoise in the 50D at higher ISO's I really wonder why you shot this at ISO640...especially since you were shooting at 1/2000 of a second. I agree that I would take something of the left as you already suggested...but the lovely perch is wonderful, so I fully understand why you did it this way.

[Krijn Trimbos]

Thanks for the suggestions and comments people!!

Jasper to explain.......
I climbed up the cliff down from where all the Gannets came in to land (the place to be for weird flightshots.......). We went up because the light was fading and wasn't ideal for flightshots anymore and we wanted to do some portraits within the other colony, when I left I had diled in ISO 640 (because against a very light blue sky the noise wasn't that noticable and I still needed the shutterspeed) and the shutterspeed and aperture. When we came up this gull suddenly perched up this beautiful perch, I first had to take off my 2x converter and because I was affraid it would fly off I started shooting. I think I got about 20 shots of this bird of which only one is showing him with his beak open, then it flew off. So it was just a trying to catch the moment thing and I am happy I did.......:D

Cheers,

Krijn

[Randy Stout]

Krijn:

I particularly like the yellow lichen and the yellow in the bill. My initial crop reaction was just what you mentioned, some off left, bit added on top, but since you did try it, have to go with your judgement.

Cheers

Randy

[Ramon M. Casares]

My only suggestion would ve to decenter the bird. The rest: pose, colors, detail, exppsure, BG, perch, textures, etc are stunning! Congratulations!