I'm Out of Here

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Photographed at Middle Creek a couple of days ago. I'm wondering if there is enough separation between the birds on the ice and the one flying away.



1D4, 500f4, 1.4x, 1/1250s, f/11, ISO 400

[Randy Stout]

Axel:

What a crowd. I agree with your concerns, and do think it would be more effective if the one flyer was higher so he would be more distinct against the out of focus birds in the background.
Nicely exposed, and I do like the little patch of water LLC.

Cheers

Randy

[Ilija Dukovski]

Oh wow, that is madness...:)
I don't think separation is too important here, I'm bothered a bit by the empty
ice actually. Another composition that comes to my mind here is a tighter crop
arounf the "Blue" Goose, (the dark morph) standing out of the crowd of the
snowies.

Cheers,

[Alfred Forns]

I like it as presented with the goose just flying out of the frame to the empty space ... out of here !! Way cool and very creative !!! ... btw that is one mass of birds :)

[Stu Bowie]

What a crowd. One can see the departing goose well enough. Did these geese stay here, or have you got any shots of them in the air. Im sure it would be a sight to behold.

[Richard Stern]

Nice atmosphere, although it took me several seconds of viewing to work out was was going on. I don't find a problem with the flying bird being in that position. I like the whites. The whole thing looks a little soft on my monitor. I imagine that scene would have made a good video clip.

Richard

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Axel, like the whites and the bird flying out. Different but I think it works. I am sure you have tight shots of nothing but the geese....at even smaller apertures. Would love to see those too.

[Christopher Miller]

Hi Axel, I like the crowd of birds with the one flying out, but personally I would prefer it to stand out a bit more. I might try cropping the top to just above the flying bird, making it into a pano.

[Markus Jais]

Very cool shot. I've not seen a similar shot of those geese before. It would already be great without the single goose leaving but this makes it a lot more interesting. The black wing-tips draw the attention to that single goose. I think there is enough separation.

It would only be better if that single goose was a Bald Eagle :)

Markus

[Paul Lagasi]

I like it the way it is, only thing I'd do if it were mine is clone out the blue phase..thats just me though.
Maybe a pano crop?

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Thanks for the comments and suggestions, it's much appreciated. I didn't sharpen the birds on the ice at all to get as much as separation as possible.

Today I made an image of a flock taking off in panic when a Bald Eagle flew their way. He was not interested in the geese as he had already caught a fish.

This is an environmental full frame image, which gives a pretty good impression of the number of birds. Today there were 120,000 Snow Geese.

[Ilija Dukovski]

Wow, I had a chance to experience this kind of madness only once in Hatfield, western MA.
A crop suggestion for this one wouild be to go with a pano just a bit over the trees.
It will catch the most dense part, with the BG taking case of the comp.
Do you agree?

[Axel Hildebrandt]

Wow, I had a chance to experience this kind of madness only once in Hatfield, western MA.
A crop suggestion for this one wouild be to go with a pano just a bit over the trees.
It will catch the most dense part, with the BG taking case of the comp.
Do you agree?

Thanks, Ilija! I've never seen that many snow geese when I lived in Northampton. I think a crop off the top would work, too.

[Jackie Schuknecht]

Very well seen and I think the ice gives the image a nice anchor for the take-off. Really like this one.