Great Blue Heron Fishing

[Dave McGowen]

Photographed this Great Blue fishing at Bosque Del Apache recently. Nikon D300, 600mm + 1.4x, ISO 250, f9, 1/1600 sec.

Thanks for looking and critiques welcome, Dave

[Don Railton]

Hi Dave

In my opinion I would have prefered if we could see the head with the beak just entering the water. It's being a bit picky I know but a bird without a head looses a lot of appeal to me. One thing this site has taught me is that the eye and eye contact draws you into the image and this is very important to connect the viewer with the image. Apart from that the technical aspects of the image (exposure, focus etc..) look good to me, just a bit late with the timing..

DON

[Randy Stout]

Dave:

I agree with Don on this one. I have many images of various herons fishing, and always try to get that critical moment when the bill is just entering the water, but you can still see the eye. Shots like this one, with head underwater, can work as part of a series, but don't stand on their own very well.

Cheers

Randy

[Jim Buescher]

This image isn't as much about the bird as it is about its behavior, therefore I find the timing just right for this action shot. My eye goes right to the birds point of entry and makes me wonder what it's after. If the head was out of the water the whole purpose of the image would be lost IMO. Sometimes we don't need that eye contact to have a compelling image such as this. The BG may be a little busy but overall I like it.

[Marina Scarr]

Hi Dave:

I love photographing this type of behavior. However, I think capturing it in this type of busy FG and BG takes away from the behavior. When I see photographs like this that I find very pleasing, it's usually with very still water and with clean FG and BG.

That said, you did well capturing the behavior. I think your picture needs a little rotation.

[Paul Guris]

I think the timing is perfect for this type of shot. An image of a bird with its bill just entering the water is a completely different image, much more portrait than action. That doesn't mean one is better than the other. I just can't see how a pose at the point where just the bill is entering the water can ever yield the "KABOOM!" feeling that this image nails. (Sorry for getting so technical. )

[Daniel Cadieux]

I kinda like images with the full head-in-water hunting behaviour, but I agree with Marina's observations (including rotation).

[Dave McGowen]

Thanks everyone for the recommendations; I do have several in the series including with a fish. However, the nictitating membrane was over the eye, so I went with this one.

As a rookie member on BPN, I am impressed and pleased with the thorough critiques.

Thanks again, Dave