12/31/2024
This will be my next-to-last photo challenge update. This post will cover the months of November and December. After this, there will be a post that covers the final portfolio review.
November-
November's challenge was to capture a "flock" of birds. By rules, this was really only two or more birds in the frame. This was another month that I had circled as a difficult month when looking at the challenges. It is not easy to frame up multiple birds in a meaningful way; in other words, eye-pleasing. I had originally planned to use a shot of a flock of Greater Flamingo from my South Africa trip. However, I already knew I would be using another shot from there for the December challenge. I really did not want to lean so heavily on that trip for photos; so, I went with a shot from Alaska. I like the shot, but I also knew there were some issues with the shot, and this gets a bit into what makes groups of birds hard to shoot.
In general, I love the feel of the shot. It was my final day in Utqiagvik, and things had been a bit tough. We were lucky to stumble onto this pair of King Eider at a pond near town. Unfortunately, it was foggy. We slowly waded our way across the pond and got within shooting distance. Light angle was good, but there was still a haze of fog that caused some detail loss. Getting closer helped, but it did not fix everything. At one point, the birds stood up, and we settled down into the water to allow them to relax.
Anyway, none of this really explains the compositional issues. Mainly, the subjects are backwards. The lead bird should be the one in focus. Or, they should both be in focus. This might have been the more ideal option. To do this, I would have had to close down the aperture - a lot. I am not sure an f/8 would have even done it. With the fog, the light was not as strong as it looks in the photo. Without a tripod, I do not think I would have had enough shutter speed. It is hard to say, and, honestly, I did not even consider it. I wish I would have, though.
In general, to my eye, when looking at groups of birds, I tend to look to the lead bird or towards the middle of the group. Since there are only two birds, there is no middle. With the lead bird being out of focus, you have to kind of look back to find the second bird. Having said all that, I plan to replace this photo for the portfolio review with a photo that breaks everything I just talked about.
So, why do I think this works better? The bird in front is blurred enough that your eye is not pulled to it. It also helps that the bird in the back is brighter, and all the lines in the photo direct your eye to that location. In the King Eider photo, the hen is enough in-focus and has enough texture that your eye is pulled to her; only to realize that she is not the subject of the photo. If the male had been more to the right with her behind and to the left, I think the photo would have been a lot stronger.
Not that I am an expert on this, but this at least summarizes not only my feelings on the photo but some of the feedback I got, as well.
December-
December's challenge was to capture a photo of a bird in flight. I do not do a lot of flight photos, but I had a number of options to choose from. Choosing one was not much of a debate. I was lucky to capture a beautiful shot of a White-capped "Shy" Albatross during my pelagic in South Africa.
I really like this photo. I will have to see how it rates. Compositionally, etc. it is a bit bland. At least it is not a bird against the sky. We were close enough to shore that I caught the bird against the mountains in the background. The pose of the bird is strong, and the water droplets flying from it along with the bit of food clasped in the bill give it a sense of action and purpose. The bird has just scooped some food from the surface of the water and is flying off with it. I look forward to hearing feedback.
This covers the final two months of the challenge. We will get feedback on our final photos, and then we will have a short time to pull together a year-end portfolio. For this portfolio, as I have eluded to above, we can swap out images. I will be replacing a number of my photos through the year with ones that I hope are a bit stronger. I will post a summary once it is complete.
Thanks for reading,
Mike
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