Black-necked Stork with Catfish

20D with 300mm f/4, f/8 1/2000 iso 400, -2/3, handheld.

In the process of sorting through some of my Australian shots from last year. This was taken during a stay in the awesome Kakadu NP in the Northern Territory. This was taken during a boat trip through the wetlands. Black-necked Stork (or Jabiru) was one of the main birds I wanted to see so to be able sit watching this one feeding was just wonderful.

Thanks

Paul
Guernsey

Nice picture and the capture with the fish just adds to it. It all adds to the photography when you can just spend time watching the bird or animal take pictures when the time is right. That would suite me for most days.

Dave

I think if this were mine I'd be tempted to crop the foreground land mass which I feel is a little distracting to my eye.

Regards

JohnS

Nice action capture Paul

For me I'd like a bit more water on the right and the whole image a bit smaller in the frame - in other words for me you've cropped it a bit too much matey

The light hasn't been doing you any favours either as it's a bit harsh and has led to a contrasty image which looks a bit 'garrish' on my monitor so maybe a tweak of negative contrast and negative saturation might be worth a try

Framing and action are great, but unfortunately the shot taken when the light was very harsh - not much you can do about that other than try and shoot earlier or later in the day when the light softens.

You cont see this sort of interaction in many bird photos. Well done.

Harsh light, but punchy colours Paul!!

looks nicely handled, and i personally like the framing/crop.

I feel the bottom area of land needs to remain, as removing it would leave the leg reflection being abruptly cut off by the bottom frame edge {just my opinion though}

Alan

Shame about the light but it's still a fantastic moment to have captured. I would love to have it in my portfolio.

Thanks for all the comments and advice. Yes the light was harsh but not much I could do about that at the time, even though this was the later boat trip the light didn't calm down until we were on our way back to base. We did do an early morning trip whilst there but if I remember correctly no storks were seen on that one.

The colours look fine on my (lovely new ) monitor, the neck of the stork really is that vibrant blue - why 'Black-necked stork' I think originates from the days before bins were invented!

I tried various crops including removing the land at the bottom but this is virtually full frame and so I just cropped slightly from the left. I might try and add a bit of canvas to the top and left as Andy suggested.

Thanks once again

Hi Paul,

Nice shot , captured at a good moment , light is a bit harsh but as we all know conditions aren't always perfect , the interaction between subjects makes for a very pleasing image.

Regards

Andy...

Forgot I had this shot as well, taken on our P&S. Thought you might like to see it, give you a feel as to just how amazing a place Kakadu is. There was so much wildlife on show at times you didn't know where to look first! And lots of crocs!