Fishing

[Grace Scalzo]

From Saturday morning. Our local beach is fantastic at times of low tide. The bottom of the Long Island Sound is not smooth and as tide recedes, pools form where bait fish get trapped and then the egrets and herons feast.

1/1000, f 5.6, ISO400
Canon mk4, 500 + 1.4tc + tripod

[denise ippolito]

Grace, Beautiful light and pose. I love that you included the water trail. I might tone down the bright spots on the bill. I really like the composition and probably wouldn't have thought to crop it like that but I will keep it in mind for the future, thanks:)

[Joe Senzatimore]

Love the light and action captured. Composition is different and very effective. Love it. Call me when the next low tide is.

[allanrube]

I like what you did here Grace. Denise mentions the crop while saying that is the only way you could get the trail in.

I have a skimmer shot where the skimmer is heading out of the frame. I have hesitated to post it as I can just hear people saying the crop isn't good.

However, I like your crop. You have a reason for "breaking" the rule. I am interested in what others say.

[Fabs Forns]

I'm loving the pose, and agree the red channel could be a bit clipped on the whites. Warm light tends to do that.
About the compo, not sure the trail is strong enough to carry all that space, since it's broken up, for me it would be to the end of the first trail, keeping the other, weaker trail out. I have the feeling it needs a tiny bit of CCW rotation and if it's OK with your post-processing ethics, I'd clone out the spec highlights on the bill.

[Grace Scalzo]

Thank you Fabs for your critique. I have knocked the reds back a tad, removed the sheen from the bill, rotated and recomposed regarding the trail. I appreciate you taking the time on my image. Better?
Thank you too Denise, Joe and Allen for commenting. Nice to get peoples' input when doing something a bit unconventional.

[Fabs Forns]

Much improvement in the comp and whites, Grace, al least, for my tastes :)

[allanrube]

I liked the original but the repost is better. Thanks Fabs for the suggestions and Grace for the postings.

[Phil Ertel]

Hi Grace,

The original was pretty nice but in my opinion the repost is better. Nice, light,action and I really like the wings display. A delightful image. Thanks for sharing.

[Arthur Morris]

Agree that Fabs' suggestions improved an already good image. I especially like the bill clean-up. Either crop works for me. Was this at Sunken Meadow?

[Grace Scalzo]

Thanks again, everyone. I learned alot from this post. Artie, this was at West Meadow, just east of Sunken.

[Lloyd Spitalnik]

Grace, I hope you'll take me there sometime :-)
Will be around the 4th weekend. See you next Thursday.

[Morkel Erasmus]

strong image to begin with - improved by the repost Grace! lovely pose, behaviour and light here

[Hendri Venter]

I also like both but the repost rocks. Well done Grace.