Photo of the month 

December 2003 

SNOW GEESE - B019

(Chen caereluscens)

Bosque del Apache, New Mexico, USA - November

4/500mm +1.4x – ISO 400

Digital Capture 

[1]

Razor sharp flight shots are nowadays easier than ever with the help of advanced Autofocus and Image Stabilization systems and even though such pictures are amazing and show wing postures, which would be almost impossible to the human eye to register, I like blur effects very much as they perfectly express the animal's motion. This picture is a good example for that. 

In order to render the background highly blurred it is necessary to follow the subject's motion with the camera (panning).

This picture shows another interesting aspect of slow shutter speed technique.

The front part of the wings gets direct sunlight: this means that a fast shutter speed would have given a frozen image of wings with dark bottom side and extremely white front edges. An extreme contrast, which is not advisable in nature photography. 

A slow shutter speed, on the other way, makes the front highlighted wing edges leave a white-golden trace, like a painter's brush.

This picture is one of my favorite out of 7500+ digital shots, which I took during 8 days at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge (New Mexico) in November 2003.

Go to the New Mexico - Portofolio to see more flight pictures of Snow Geese and Sandhill Cranes.