ML379215251 OBI 69712
Contributor
Date
Location
- Age
- Not specified
- Sex
- Not specified
- Behaviors
- Flying
Media notes
In flight from above. Remarks: 1st Prize for Best Photograph award in Bird-A-Thon. The real task was shooting this beauty, as it was not allowing a close approach and was very fast in the flight. At Ranjit Sagar Dam, there was a pair of these switching three perching points and diving into the water for a prey simultaneously. Seeking this opportunity as a portrait of this black and white beauty can be taken as all these points were within close vicinity of each other and the specimen did not try to move anywhere else; I decided to focus on this bird as the rest of the team was busy in identifying other birds. The perches were a sloping wall near the entrance to the dam gate, a levelling scale abutting the tall tower of the dam and the last being the dam wall itself. The kingfisher, despite the efforts of approaching it slowly on the dam and the sloping wall, used to take-off unexpectedly. However, its perch at the water-level scale was the most secured and was only cast off while hunting for fish. A point to be noted here is the Pied Kingfisher is more elegant in flight then while on a perch. This reminded me of a past jury conversation with Yuwaraj Gurjar, where he had mentioned that in a flight image of the upper-wings of a bird is more important than its under-wings. Unlike many other locations, this was a better location to achieve the upper wing image of this kind of kingfisher. I attempted a number of strategies to get a perfect shot of this charm, but all failed. As due to the time limitation of the Bird-A-Thon, our session at the dam came to an end. Rest of the team members started proceeding towards the gate. I also began my steps away from the vantage point. But again before leaving, there was a sharp call. The Pied Kingfisher had returned on the sloping wall. This was the final opportunity. But the problem was that the bird will fly away as soon as I am exposed to it. Seeking this problem as the better chance, I moved forward and focused my lens on it as soon as it took off. This is when this picture was shot, it was the first one which I shortlisted for the five photographs to be submitted for the award. I am very much grateful to the team leader Ashish Pankhariya for taking right decisions regarding the places to visit and spending a considerable time at each one of them. Thanks to Arpit Deomurari and Yashodhan Bhatia for being the jury. Also thanks to rest of the team members ManishBhai RK and Anish for their assistance in the bird race. And thanks to Saevus Wildlife India LLP for organising this memorable event. - SM. Date added to OBI: January 10, 2013.
Collection
Technical information
- Model
- Canon EOS 7D
- Lens
- EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM
- ISO
- 160
- Focal length
- 400 mm
- Flash
- Flash did not fire
- f-stop
- f/5.6
- Shutter speed
- 1/1000 sec
- Dimensions
- 483 pixels x 600 pixels
- Original file size
- 66.64 KB