First post here, so please don’t kill me 
African Skimmer. Taken in Chobe National Park, Botswana. This was my second trip using the Panasonic GX 8 and Vario-Elmar 100-400 which enabled me to take more birdshots than I usually do.
Welcome, Jaapv. This is a very good first avian post. The exposure looks good and I love the pose. Three things that I think could make this image a bit better: I think you could crop from the top and the bottom both. There just seems to be more canvas than needed vertically. The second and third points are related. The depth of field seems rather shallow and the point of focus seems to be a bit in front of the bird so most of the bird is a bit soft. I’m not familiar with your equipment, but in most cases shooting birds that have any kind of busy foreground or background, it pays to use either a single focus point or a small group of focus points, so you’re sure the camera selects the head (preferably the eye) as the point of focus. It;s still a cool shot of a nice bird and I look forward to seeing more of your work.
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Thank you :)I see your points. The crop is a good idea. It would bring the native 4/3rds format down to the more usual. Getting rid of the shallow DOF would be a bit hard with an 800 mm equivalent lens, though.
Thanks for the clarification on the lens/camera combination, Jaapv. I didn’t know the crop factor for that camera. You might want to post shooting parameters (shutter speed, f-stop, iso, etc). It helps make for more meaningful critiques.
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Dennis covered it pretty well. I just want to say this is a really good first post. the spread wings and open beak are a great pose.
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I will do a rework - I think PP was not optimal.
I do like this one much better, Jaapv. Nice job on the reprocessing.
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