“That face, that face, that wonderful face!” With apologies to Alan Bergman and Lew Spence, I can’t resist using their lyrics to caption this shot. And, I have to say, the closing lines are really quite true:
“Oh never will these eyes behold a sight that could replace
That face, That face, That face, That face,
That face, That face, That face.”
I found this roseate spoonbill at Safari West in Santa Rosa. I’ve tried to capture good shots of roseate spoonbills in Port Aransas, Texas as they forage along the water’s edge but we’ve always been too far away for me to see their faces in such detail. They are the most colorful birds I see in Port A, with their stunning pink plumage, their unwieldy blue spoon shaped bills, and their piercing red eyes. I was happy to finally manage a decent closeup of one. At 400mm, I had the lens wide open (f/5.6) and I was able to blur out the netting in front of the spoonbill’s “wonderful face.”
Focal Length 400mm, ISO 500, F/5.6, 1/200
I used Aperture Priority instead of manual settings and I was pleased with the results at Safari West. Just like when I began using higher ISO settings, it’s been hard for me to convert from all manual settings but I must admit I’m finding that my exposure is improving using Aperture and Shutter priority settings in some situations.
The face only a mother could love😄
Carol
Come visit me next spring and we’ll go to High Island where you can shoot hundreds if these up close
Connie
Good demonstration of a technique I heard of years ago from a photo instructor. Wide open shooting through a mesh fence will blur out the fence to the point where it disappears. Most photographers I’ve talked to use Aperture Priority almost exclusively, then they pick their point of focus in a static situation to use the available depth of field effectively. Depth of field is approx. 1/3 third in front of the point of focus & 2/3rds behind it.