Sunrise Kingfisher

[Stu Bowie]

My favourate subject enjoying the early morning sun rays. No Flapping wings, no take off, just chilling and scanning for his next meal. Taken in the Pilanesberg Nature reserve. My favourate hide too.

Canon 50D
100-400 L IS USM @ 400mm
1/800
F/6.3
ISO 800

Exp Comp 0
Hand Held

[Axel Hildebrandt]

I like the light, sharpness, head angle and BG and would darken the pupil and tone down the highlights a bit more.

[Brian Barcelos]

Stuart, Very nice. Love the warm light here and the BG is excellent. Agree with darkening the pupil .

Brian

[Chris Kotze]

Super light and colours. Lovely pose and well exposed. Great captured

[Krijn Trimbos]

Lovely subject and good light! Agree with Axel on the catchlight and the highlights. Like the BG very much, well done!

[Daniel Cadieux]

Eye-work was my first thought too. Excellent pose, the head turn just a wee bit towards us puts the pose over the top for me! How can this bird be "chilling" with such wonderful "warm" light!:D

[Doug Brown]

Lovely pose, perch, and BG. Wonderful light too. Axel's points regarding the pupil and the highlights are excellent.

[Stu Bowie]

Thanks so much for all the constructive feedback guys. Here is my repost with darkened pupil, and toning down of the highlights. ( I slipped up there. :o )

[Daniel Cadieux]

Yes! Repost looks great...

[Axel Hildebrandt]

The repost looks much better, well done!

[Randy Stout]

Stuart:

Excellent repost. Cleared up my only issue with the original.

Cheers

Randy

[Kiran Poonacha]

Beautiful one Brother... the repost works well,

[David Fletcher]

Cracking repost! Nothing else to add: :):)

[Stephen Earle]

Repost is better Stu. Man, that Mankwe light and bg is to die for!

[Gal Shon]

Very good repost, lovely image.

[Ramon M. Casares]

Lovely, great perch, light, BG, detail, exposure and sharpness. Here Kingfishers have much more darker eyes so IMO the eye looks too bright, but I've never seen this particular species before.
Congratulations!

[Ákos Lumnitzer]

Awesome image Stu. The repost is really good too, much nicer pupil. Perfect BG and HA. Thanks for sharing.

[Dave Barnes]

Repost looks great. NTS

[Simon Bennett]

Gorgeous light and cool bird.

[Stu Bowie]

Thank you all so much for the kind words.

[Mervin Quah]

I am blown off !!!!!