Male Hoodie in flight

Gallery: AvianPosted July 20, 2014417 views9 comments

Nikon D4
1/3200
ISO 640
F/8
Manual
600 = 1.4 TC
White Balance Auto
Metering Center weighted average
Cropped 66% (From 16.1 MP down to 5.2MP)
Shot from tripod using Wimberly Head
Lightroom 5 and Photoshop Elements 9

Just got back back from a three week trip to Yellowstone/Grand Tetons and thought I would go straight to Nature Photographers and get an image posted.
This image was taken way back around Christmas time at a local pond. This is the same pond that I shot the Mandarin duck image I posted a while back. There were initially two pairs of woodies but the other pair was driven off by this male and his mate. This pond holds lots of ducks which makes it pretty difficult to get clean shots and clean water. Not complaining but you gotta take a lot of shots to get some good ones. These guys are really, really fast in flight so getting flight shots takes some patience and a few days of shooting. This pair only flew once or twice a day and you never knew when. You could tell when the male was getting antsy but 9 times out of ten it was all for naught. The female almost always flew when the male flew but I don't remember a time when the female flew first. So I kept my camera glued to the male.
This is probably the best flight image I have of the male. These guys are really tough to expose for particularly when the sun is out and it was out almost ever day I shot these guys this past winter. This image was taken relatively early in the morning but the sun was fully shining and this was not ideal light. Did the best I could in post to cover both the blacks and the whites.
Hope you like it anyway. I really enjoy these little characters of the duck world. Hope you do too.
Let me know if I can enhance this in any way. Larger image included. Have a great week.

Comments

9 comments

Comment posted by Dennis Plank on July 20, 2014 at 9:59 PM

An excellent job handling the exposure and processing, David. Extremely crisp detail. I do wish your pond didn't have so much dark green reflection as a little more contrast with the bg would really make this image pop, but it's still a really sweet image. As is often the case with low contrast between subject and bg, the larger image seems to work much better.

Registered on January 28, 2008, 1767 Posts, 23192 Comments

Comment posted by Jerry Austin on July 20, 2014 at 10:28 PM

Simply awesome.

Registered on January 6, 2012, 651 Posts, 3448 Comments

Comment posted by Jim DeWitt on July 21, 2014 at 1:56 AM

Spectacular, David. I wish the bird has a bit more virtual room to fly into, but that's a very minor nit on a superb shot.

Registered on August 28, 2006, 1240 Posts, 8506 Comments

Comment posted by Jim Hackley on July 21, 2014 at 1:45 PM

Wonderful flight shot with nice detail as the crop held up very well. A difficult contrast shot with the dark background but I like the flight pose with wings down so you can see head/eye contact. Way to go.

Registered on September 17, 2009, 302 Posts, 5535 Comments

Comment posted by David Salem on July 22, 2014 at 2:55 AM

What an awesome frame Dave. I really like these guys and would love to get a chance to shot them in flight. Nice pose with the wings down and I like the eye contact and it looks nice and sharp. Looks a bit dark on my monitor. I might be tempted to selectivley lighten the darks in the bird.
Great job on a not to often seen IF frame.

Registered on June 25, 2014, 6 Posts, 67 Comments

Comment posted by Rob Drummond on July 22, 2014 at 8:25 AM

Spectacular David - great detail and I love the texture of the background

Registered on November 8, 2003, 617 Posts, 8267 Comments

Comment posted by Kurt Bowman on July 22, 2014 at 9:42 PM

Great job of stopping the action David. This is my nemesis duck (as far as flight shots go). I don't care how prepared I am...I will be waiting for 20-30 minutes with my finger on the shutter and I will look away for 2 seconds and of course, that is when they take off...and as you know, catching up to them is not easy. So I have a lot of admiration for you on this shot. Also a tough dick to expose. It does look a tad under on my monitor and might lighten the shadows. The wing tips are getting a little lost with the dark BG. But great work!!!

Registered on June 19, 2008, 1005 Posts, 8028 Comments

Comment posted by Nate Chappell on July 23, 2014 at 1:58 PM

Beautiful flight shot David, excellent exposure control, maybe a little more room in front to make it not as centered.

Registered on February 1, 2006, 1158 Posts, 19528 Comments

Comment posted by David Bogener on July 23, 2014 at 4:14 PM

Nicely exposed flight shot. Did you use a layer mask during processing? I do like the wing position, but wish for an angle where more of the wonderful contrasting chestnut underbelly is visible. They are such beautiful ducks!

Registered on October 30, 2013, 417 Posts, 1255 Comments