An Arctic Tern, hovering over the mouth of the Lowe River, Valdez, Alaska in search of salmon fry. These are one of the most elegant looking birds that I know of and can be difficult to photograph as they flit around so quickly. It’s much easier to capture them when they’re hunting for fish though because they are frequently hovering.
Is this a composite: No
Sony a6500, SEL200600G @ 397 mm, ISO-320, f/6.3, 1/3200, hand held.
What a lovely, peaceful image. It just seems so tranquil to me with the nice background to complement the splendid wing position. I really like that you did not crop this down to something tighter. It works really well as presented.
Elegance in Action #1 - - Here is the frame just 1/12th second before the posted one. It has more conventional wing positions so I preferred the 2nd frame.
Excellent, Gary. I like your choice of the wing position. While both images are beautiful, the one you chose is more unique and I like the look of it more. The outstretched far wing really adds to the composition. It does look to my eye as if there’s a fair amount of chromatic noise in the background-you might want to run a little noise reduction on that part of the image.
Nice to see you posting again. I like both images and I do think the color in the second image is a little better with respect to the background. These birds are tough to get good detail. They moved very quickly and haphazardly making them a very difficult subject.
Thanks, David! I finally retired (after 43.5 years with the company) and have been dealing with all the transition process since May of this year. Between Social Security, Medicare, Supplemental Health Insurance, pension & 401K transition and financial distributions it’s been exhausting! I hope to spend much more time with the photography in the near future though.
Hi Gary
Both shots are great, but I vote for the first one. It shows more of the tern acrobatic skill.
Peter
Hi Gary,
Yes, Terns are so graceful in the air, especially when they are slowing down and you can really catch them. I love the first image too for its more unique wing position. I like the sharpness of the Tern against the blurry background…it really stands out.
