Very highly Ian!

Perhaps should have mentioned these are all handheld too. The Grebe shots are slightly cropped, others are full frame.

Hmmm, well I think if you chop the top off, especially to below the light grey seal, then it's much more of a shot of the seal that's in focus. You lose some of the depth of the shot without the water at the top, I think, but I can see why you'd want it to go, and it may be a comment I'd make about someone else's shot.

Thanks all for the comments, I was very pleased with these photos.

By the way, does anyone know what type of fish the Grebe's got?

Dan

You don't think I know that? Problem was he was only about 5 foot away and they don't stop running about. This was the best for focusing, but not for framing. Perhaps I'll clone in a tail from another pic.

Dan

It's a hard habit to get out of, and sometimes it's useful to have this mindset anyway - better than firing off 1000 shots in the hope that one is going to be okay. But I often take a lot more shots of a subject than I need, simply because as I start taking photos, the composition starts to develop, you see different ways to approach it, and you hopefully end up with an image that's better than the one you started with.

No substitute for practice here I think, so being a bit more trigger happy, and varying the aperture, focal length etc as you go, will be the quickest way to find what works for you.

Following on from John's post, you might find that when using these smaller apertures the background becomes too focused. In this example, you just need to move it further away. The greater the distance between your subject and the background, the better you can isolate the subject, even when using smaller apertures.

Dan

Well, for a shot like this, where you've got all the time in the world, I would take several shots at different apertures/focal lengths/exposures and pick which one I liked the best. That's one of the beauties of digital.

Dan

Thanks for that. A crop didn't occur to me, because I really like the open space at the top, and the subtle tones there.

The first one reminds me of feathers.

Dan

Some shots of the wildlife we saw in Norfolk, Great Crested Grebes on the River Ant near Barton Broad, Grey Seals on the beach near Horsey and Turnstones at Salthouse.

Grebe shots were taken from a boat we hired for a few hours.








(Unfortunately taken on 31st March, otherwise it would have been in the fortnightly competition! :evil
















All with K10D and DA*300mm.

Dan

Last week we went to Norfolk (near Stalham), and spent a fair amount of time on different beaches. These though are all from Sea Palling beach. All with the K10D and FA50mm 1.4.











And being near the Broads, couldn't help but take a few windpumps.








And a visit to Cromer pier on a foggy friday resulted in this:





Wildlife pics on another thread in a minute or two.

If you want to see the full holiday snaps, they're in my facebook albums:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=68750&id=1329753713&l=e41751a4e7

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=68753&id=1329753713&l=db7cec3bef

Dan

It looks a bit soft.

Dan

And most definitely on the street too!

Dan

Oh, all right then, I'll be nice.

Dan