Click on the image for licensing terms
Have you ever seen Alfred Hitchcock's film 'The Birds'?
If you have, you might get slightly nervous in the presence of a slowly advancing troop of seagulls, seemingly fixated on the sandwich in your hand, but who knows what's going on inside their bird brains?
This particularly bold specimen fixed me with its beady stare at a distance of about two metres while Liz and I were eating our picnic at the Cap de Formentor lighthouse, so I took the opportunity to take this photograph before it a) flew away, or b) took my fingers off.
Focused on the seagull's eye, a wide open aperture ensured a fast shutter speed and pin sharp image, while the same wide open aperture helped blur distracting background elements, such as regrettable tourists like ourselves.
Because the seagull's feathers were so bright, I also dialled in some negative exposure compensation to make sure the fine detail didn't get burned out.
Having taken the photo, Liz and I quickly finished our picnic, at which point the seagulls seemed to lose interest in us for soome reason - funny that!
Filename - seagull 01.jpg
Camera - Canon EOS 6D
Lens - 24-105mm zoom @ 88mm
Exposure - 1/1250 sec @ f4, ISO100
Location - Cap Formentor, Mallorca
This image - 800x640px JPEG
Conversion - Adobe Lightroom
Comments - -0.3ev exposure compensation used to preserve highlight detail
All content copyright © Howard Litherland 2009-2024 unless otherwise stated.