'Leucistic' Kite

Just spent a great week in Wales photographing some beautiful wildlife this beautiful place has to offer with a group of friends/wildlife photographers.I went to Gigrin for the very first time to photograph the beautiful Red Kites when this 'Leucistic' Kite turned up.It has started to visit the feeding station more and more after being born in 2003 and until recently had'nt been seen for some time I was told by the owners of Gigrin.Leucistic means that the colouration is mainly pure white and not the usual red or black of the normal kites and not to be confused with an 'Albino' as these lack colouring and have pink eyes unlike the yellow/blue eyes of this beautiful Leucistic Kite.The weather was changing thoughout the day and here I captured him just lifting off almost like a RAF 'Heavy Bomber'pose and the BG is the overcast conditons I had,with the grey/white clouds forming a dividing line here,its very different I feel and shows what ever the weather throws at you there is always a shot to be had

All Comments And Advice Welcome

Nikon D3S
Nikon F4VR600
F8,1/1000
iso 400,+0.7ev
Matrix
PP-LR2.6,CS3,Full Frame

Thanks For Looking

Hi Craig I've Seen this Leucistic Kite and I would say this is as good Ive seen photographed Well done.

Dale

Fantastic capture Craig. Reminds me of a Tornado GR4 to equate with your
RAF 'Heavy Bomber' analogy. Well worth a week in wild Wales (excuse the alliteration) Leucism, albinism and melanism are fascinating subjects. A superb image.

Craig

A pleasure to view you have used the prevailing conditions to best effect.

Overcast conditions can be a great help when it comes to capturing detail on pale subjects. The sky is just dark enough to show it off nicely. This is lovely Craig, one of the nicest Gigrin shots I have seen for a long time.
eric

My hat off to you, Craig, stunning capture

I think this is a cracking image Craig with some lovely detail

Excellent Craig, a wonderful image

Phil Newman

This is a cracking shot,Craig.Very well exposed and great composition too.

Phil.

Hello Craig.

Beautifully captured and processed and the overcast conditions have worded in your favour on this one.

I really like the soft colours on this one and the pose and eye detail is great.

That's worked really well Craig - congratulations!

Tim

Thank you for your kind comments

Hi Craig,

Wonderful shot of this beautiful bird i have seen and recorded last year too.
Well done!

greetings,

Jeroen Stel

Well caught,

Not sure if its just the angle, but the wing length/formulae also looks very short/broad for a "normal" red kite, it looks extremely dumpy and not at all elegant!

Craig, I don't know if it's my eyes or this works monitor but there looks to be some wavy lines along the dividing edge of the cloud? Nice capture of the bird although I can see what Mike means regarding the 'dumpiness'.

Thanks for your comments,Robert I see a few lines but they are not on the Raw file,so either my processing is out or when I have re-sized to 720 this has happened,better images on my blog