The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
Description
I had been watching the grebes for over half an hour, and the youngsters were hungry. No food offered! So I was sure that something was going to happen. Suddenly I saw one of the parents coming with a small fish and I moved 30 feet to get a better view. That was a mistake. While I shot this image, a lot of noise came from the place I just left. The other parent had spotted a rival and a bitter fight started, of which I missed the best part. I returned as fast as I could, and in the mess I got a few images, but not very good. The grebe grabbed its rival at the neck with its bill and tried to drown the other bird. That one struggled for survival, succeeded in getting above the water line but was pushed back under water again. Finally it wrestled free and disappeared under water, with torpedo speed. The most exciting thing: after the fight, the two parents came together and started mating display, as is usual at the beginning of the relation. Apparently, the bond was confirmed after the fight.
I think the backstory is the best part! I’m glad you were able to capture this moment so well but it sounds like you would have preferred to capture the fight.
That would have been nice to see, the behavior shown here is valuable but let’s face it, we all love to see a good fight, right!
Maybe you can find one or two images that you find worthy of sharing and if you do, I look forward to seeing it!
Sorry you missed the excitement, Han. Sounds like a real brawl. I’m not surprised at the renewed courtship afterward-it’s just the sort of thing to trigger that kind of behavior.
As far as the image goes, you might look at cropping from the bottom to get rid of the out of focus foreground chick. If that brings you too far up you can crop a little lower and pretty easily eliminate anything left of the foreground bird.
Hi Han, Love seeing the feeding behavior of the adult and chick. The color of the fish adds a point of interest for me too. I like Dennis’ idea of eliminating the chick on the bottom which would put all attention on the interaction of the other two birds.
Thanks, @Merv , @Dennis_Plank and @Allen_Sparks for yhour comments.
I like the suggestion of a crop, so I gave it a try. I chopped a bit off the chick in the front, to create a bit more space in the FG, and I also cropped a bit off the top. Otherwise the image feels a bit out of balance.
About the fight: I could post a small series of images as a “project”, although this is kind of abusing the category. I’ll think about it.
