Diving Down

[Stu Bowie]

Last weekend I had the pleasure of taking Tony ( Whitehead ) with me to the Pilanesberg nature reserve. I promised him some Pied Kingfishers, and he came away with a lot of winners which Im sure he will share with us once he gets home in a few weeks time. Here is one of my images from last weekend. The weather was overcast, and I wished for more ss. I have extended the canvas at the bottom.

Canon 50D
100-400 @ 400mm
1/1000
F/5.6
ISO 640

Exp Comp +0.33
Hand held.

[Randy Stout]

Stuart:

Great sense of motion here. In a perfect world, I might prefer it a millisecond later with the tail clear of the branch, but there is enough contrast that it stands out well from the branch.

Exposure on these guys is tough, because despite it being a overcast day, the whites look at bit washed out of detail in some areas.

Do you have anymore room on the left? Just curious how a bit more would impact the composition.

Cheers

Randy

[Stu Bowie]

Thanks Randy. Unfortunately, I dont have any more room. Although one usually can see which way they are supposed to take off, this one didnt go to plan, as I use one of the outer focussing points, thus leaving space for them to fly into.

[Daniel Cadieux]

Good timing Stuart. I personally think there may be too much canvas at bottom. I would also smooth out the faint horizontal line running across the image directly beneath the wings. I like the wing blur - good sense of motion :-)

[Markus Jais]

Great shot. I like the direction of movement into the picture, the great BG and the motion blur of the wings. This might also work as a horizontal or at least with a little bit taken away at the bottom.

Markus

[Harshad Barve]

Beautiful image Stuartbhai , loving that motion blurr
TFS

[arash_hazeghi]

Hadn't seen this one before, nice dive pose!

[Stu Bowie]

Thanks a stack for the feedback and comments guys. Much appreciated.

[Tony Whitehead]

Great memories of a fantastic day, Stuart. I would favour a landscape crop without the added canvas I think. Head looks nice and sharp. I haven't had a chance to go through my images with the subsequent chaos. Looking forward to having the time to revisit the day.

[Stu Bowie]

Thanks a lot Tony. Im really glad you got your shots. Looking forward to seeing them processed. Cheers.