Mallard drake take off

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Still processing some images from earlier. Hope you like this one. I know its not the ideal wing position. For honing ducks-in-flight skills, I worked a lot on Mallards this winter.

40D. 400 f/5.6L at f/6.3. iso 640. 1/4000s. evaluative with 0 comp. All C&C welcome.

[Fabs Forns]

Agree on your self critique about the wings, but good subject to proactive because they are always in a hurry :)
Good job of freezing it, you could have gone to ISO 400 judging by the s/s, always evident in hindsight ;)
Nice eye contact and colors. I take some people will be distracted by the upper lighter part.
TFS.

[Arthur Morris]

With the clean view of the face, neck, and breast I am fine with this wing positon (that is usually not my favorite) :) But it works here. All else is spot-on.

[Kiran Poonacha]

Wow bhai,loved the angle and the water drops add very well to this frame..

[Dan Fleming]

Agree with the above. The frozen droplets are great. Good catchlight in the eye. I am not bothered by the wing position and the light area above could be distracting but I kind of like that it gives a sense of the habitat. Low angle is great.

[Judy Lynn Malloch]

Beautiful flight action and excellent detail and beautiful eye contact. Fine work and many thanks for sharing Kaustubh.

[Trivedi Vatsal]

Amazing image as always sirji!! Just hats off to you & your work!! You have done amazing work with these Mallards!

[arash_hazeghi]

Very nice Kaustubh, everything is great, a slightly better wing position will take this to the top.

[Juan Aragonés]

I agree with your selfcritic about the wing position and I agree with artie about the overlap between the head and the wing but sure I would love to have this one in my files. Light is really nice and low angle works really well. Love the small water droplets floating in the iar and the intense stare of the drake. :)

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Thx everyone. really appreciate it.