Adrian Binney, PPSA, LRPS  


Acrobatic Male Frigate Bird by Adrian Binney, PPSA, LRPS

November 2024 - Acrobatic Male Frigate Bird

November 2024 - Adrian Binney, PPSA, LRPS

Original

November 2024 - Adrian Binney, PPSA, LRPS

Original 2

About the Image(s)

This was taken at a beach on the Pacific coast of Ecuador in February 2023. We were there many hours, during which many locally trapped tiny fish in nets thrown in the sea from the beach. This attracted hundreds of birds, large and small, including the interesting male frigate bird with its large bright red pouch. The extra image included to the right shown the scene a little earlier than when the main image was shown. I’ve had this Accepted as a Travel image in Exhibitions. I found the acrobatics of the larger fish amazing, as they picked up dropped mall fish in the shallow waters, only dropping their beak at the last minute grab the fish. I’ve cropped the image only partially to show some of the scene, while hopefully leaving the bird clear enough and large enough. The image was taken with my Olympus gear, and a 40-150 f2.8 lens at 92mm 9so FF 184), with the settings of 1/2,000 f3.2 ISO320. PP was in Lightroom.


This round’s discussion is now closed!
5 comments posted




Jerry Biddlecom   Jerry Biddlecom
The action of the bird nabbing the fish is quite well done -- nice and sharp and good color balance. The only problem is owing to the spread out wings giving a thin profile to the bird, there remains too many other visual elements competing for attention -- the coiled rope and the edge of the boat. Yes, the rope and boat provide a setting for the story, but here the diving bird should be the center of attention. After all, it's in the title of your image. I really do like the alternate picture.   Posted: 11/11/2024 18:11:00
Adrian Binney   Adrian Binney
Very interesting Jerry - I can understand what you say. How about this as an alternative tighter crop, which has also been rotated to take out the boat and rope shadow areas? I would welcome your views.   Posted: 11/11/2024 18:40:50
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Bruce Benson   Bruce Benson
Adrian, a difficult image to get the best composition, and agree with Jerry, about liking the alternate image better. Bruce   Posted: 11/13/2024 03:17:00



Cindy Marple   Cindy Marple
A fish-feeding frenzy is such an exciting thing to watch, and tough to capture images due to the sheer number of birds around! Nice to capture the Frigatebird with his bright red pouch alone like this, and at a peak of action.
I like the idea of keeping the other elements in the frame for the story. I felt the image was unbalanced though, with the bird at the bottom of the frame, looking down- it rendered the other elements more of a distraction because your eye was directed away from them. So I tried a different crop, keeping the reflection so that focal point is more central in the image. I kept the boat and rope but you could also elminiate those and just have the bird and reflection.
Just a couple of options. I do also like the alternate image, it has a good story.   Posted: 11/15/2024 01:28:42
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Steve Cole   Steve Cole
Considering you had a very busy original capture, you did a nice job with your cropping to highlight the single bird action. The other capture is nice for showing the action from a broader perspective of the scene.   Posted: 11/18/2024 18:02:27