Leon,

You have done well to get this close with the 40-150mm lens, good result.
Did you crop the feet off, I think it would look much better with them and a little more space above the head. only my opinion.
Keep up the good work.

Regards: Peter

This is a unusual shot , have seen the shaking before but then it was done after a dip in to the water...;-))
I agree about the feet, if you cropped them you can glue them on again...;-))

Well done like it...Regards,

G'Day Peter:

Thank You so much for the kind words. Yes; indeed, I did crop this photo (50%); sorry but I forgot to mention that when I posted the image. The lower legs and feet were blocked by foliage. I just checked the original and I only cropped about an inch (~10mm) of what was exposed of the legs. As for the top of the photo, there was a lot of unpleasant clutter (stumps, sticks and highly reflective mud) on the far side of the bank of the canal that was distracting and anything but flattering; it had to go. But you're right a bit more space would have been better; there just wasn't much usable space available.

BTW: I've really appreciated your bird images you've captured with your ZD 50-200, but I just visited your page of images and saw that small castle for the first time. That image is sublime and would make a wonderful print.

Ciao!

-leon

G'Day Fons:

Thanks once again for your comments. As I just explained to Peter I didn't crop much of the exposed legs - maybe 10mm. I shot this photo 'on the fly' as I was concerned that I'd miss the extremely ruffled feathers if I didn't act quickly. As a result the image was rather underexposed (metering off the water - which was reflecting the sky); fortunately, I was able to fix it up a bit with a little post processing.

Ciao!

-leon

Leon,

What a lovelt capture.

Kindest regards:Karen