Share Your Best Photo of the Day

[IKLland]

[stitch58]

3 hours ago, pictaker said:

actually yesterday but I didnt have time to post,rarity for jersey and especially from land

Thick Billed Murre

 

Awesome!! Been wanting to chase it but haven't been able to yet!

[heme42]

[Kevin]

6 hours ago, pictaker said:

actually yesterday but I didnt have time to post,rarity for jersey and especially from land

Thick Billed Murre

 

As usual, an incredible photo! 

[xpoetmarcr]

8 hours ago, Peromyscus said:

Omg the inside of the mouth is blue too? ?

I was wondering about that, too.

[NorthernKeys]

I'll never get tired of trying to get flight shots of Bonaparte's Gulls. :) This one came out pretty decent, in my opinion!

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/415957501

[smskelton]

[Johnd]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Clip]

[hbvol50]

[IKLland]

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/416220521

[Aidan B]

Couldn't have been more cooperative! Got within 2 feet of me! I'm thrilled my lifer Blackburnian warbler was so cooperative!

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/416226711

 

[IKLland]

28 minutes ago, Aidan B said:

Couldn't have been more cooperative! Got within 2 feet of me! I'm thrilled my lifer Blackburnian warbler was so cooperative!

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/416226711

 

I still need one. Awesome shot! 

[Charlie Spencer]

Saturday was my first birding trip to southern coastal SC, a trip organized by the SC Wildlife Federation.  The weather was incredibly cooperative for mid-February, light breeze and the high 60s.  After checking all the photos and cross-referencing the other birders' checklists, I wound up with a single-checklist record of 45 species. and a single-day 66.   The group as a whole had 85.

Here's the best shots from each of the two state Wildlife Management Areas.

Bear Island WMA, Colleton County, SC.  14 Feb 2022.  Five of the 64 spoonbills.

Donnelley WMA, also in Colleton.  Seven of the 54 pellys.

Edited February 14, 2022 by Charlie Spencer

[IKLland]

3 minutes ago, Charlie Spencer said:

Saturday was my first birding trip to southern coastal SC, a trip organized by the SC Wildlife Federation.  The weather was incredibly cooperative for mid-February, light breeze and the high 60s.  After checking all the photos and cross-referencing the other birders' checklists, I wound up with a single-checklist record of 45 species. and a single-day 66.   The group as a whole had 85.

Here's the best shots from each of the two state Wildlife Management Areas.

Bear Island WMA, Colleton County, SC.  14 Feb 2022.  Five of the 64 spoonbills.

Donnelley WMA, also in Colleton.  Seven of the 54 pellys.

Love that first photo! 

[Charlie Spencer]

6 minutes ago, IKLland said:

Love that first photo! 

Coming from you, I consider that high praise indeed! 

Somewhere here on Whatbird is my tale of chasing spooners a few years ago.  It ended barely successfully when I was at my last stop, looking at a Brown Pelican, and three spooners flew through my field of view about a mile behind it.  Saturday we had tons.  I missed the shot of about 40 of them perched in trees about 70 yards on the far side of a small river.

For giggles, here's the original.  Other than cropping, the one above is straight out of the camera.

Edited February 14, 2022 by Charlie Spencer

[IKLland]

1 hour ago, Charlie Spencer said:

Coming from you, I consider that high praise indeed! 

 

Please, I’m a very new photographer, and not even close to having truly outstanding images. 

 

1 hour ago, Charlie Spencer said:

Coming from you, I consider that high praise indeed! 

Somewhere here on Whatbird is my tale of chasing spooners a few years ago.  It ended barely successfully when I was at my last stop, looking at a Brown Pelican, and three spooners flew through my field of view about a mile behind it.  Saturday we had tons.  I missed the shot of about 40 of them perched in trees about 70 yards on the far side of a small river.

For giggles, here's the original.  Other than cropping, the one above is straight out of the camera.

Nice! Exposure looks good, my only thing is, to me, I would add a bit more contrast. However, contrast is a very personal thing. Some people like less contrast, some people like medium, and some like a ton. I like more than medium, but not a ton of contrast. To me, the colors look a tad dull, but then again, it’s a personal taste. 

[smskelton]

American Avocet

[Charlie Spencer]

13 hours ago, IKLland said:

Some people like less contrast, some people like medium, and some like a ton. I like more than medium, but not a ton of contrast. To me, the colors look a tad dull, but then again, it’s a personal taste. 

And some of us like doing as little as possible.  It's only in the last six months I've even begun cropping.  This time last year I would have posted the uncropped original and moved on.

The colors look a tad dull because it was overcast at the time, and the birds themselves looked a tad dull.  I'm more interested in creating memories than art.  That's what they looked like, that's what I want to remember.  I started cropping only so the images will be useful in McCaulay, and I don't save the cropped versions.

Edited February 15, 2022 by Charlie Spencer

[Clip]

Best of the day so far but it is pretty early. From my backyard.

[IKLland]

1 hour ago, Charlie Spencer said:

And some of us like doing as little as possible.  It's only in the last six months I've even begun cropping.  This time last year I would have posted the uncropped original and moved on.

The colors look a tad dull because it was overcast at the time, and the birds themselves looked a tad dull.  I'm more interested in creating memories than art.  That's what they looked like, that's what I want to remember.  I started cropping only so the images will be useful in McCaulay, and I don't save the cropped versions.

That’s perfectly fine. Like I said, everyone has their own tastes. I prefer to make the bird look as it did in person. Human eyes can see a much wider range of colors than a cameras sensor, so an original image is not going to have the same color appearance as our eyes. Editing can get that. Some people, like me, want it to look as the bird does in person, and editing fixes that. But for others, they want to present what the camera captured, whether it looks entirely natural or not. Nice photo, either way.

[dragon49]

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/416461531



 

[PalmWarbler]

18 hours ago, IKLland said:

not even close to having truly outstanding images.

What do you mean?! Your photos are amazing!

[IKLland]

1 hour ago, PalmWarbler said:

What do you mean?! Your photos are amazing!

I wouldn’t say amazing. I’m very happy with them, but there not amazing. 

[heme42]