A brightly lit bird or animal in front of a shaded background is a great combination because all of the attention is directed to the subject. Notice in this shot of a white-fronted bee-eater from South Africa how the bird stands out in relation to the background. With a beautiful bird, sometimes all a photographer can do is to just get the shot and, hopefully, it's sharp. Being aware of the background, though, means that sometimes you can change the shooting angle to put a more pleasing background behind the subject. A background darker than the subject one of the techniques I use to make my photographs have visual impact. The settings for this were 1/2000, f/4, 500 ISO, and I used a Canon 500mm f/4 lens.
6 Comments
Jul 16, 2017, 11:24:45 PM
Jim - Hi Daniel, I never, ever, crop my pictures into squares. I don't like that shape for photographs. Even when I shot medium format film, I never used 6 x 6 cm. Instead, I opted for 6 x 7cm because I find the rectangle more pleasing than the square. I realize this is totally subjective, but that's my preference.
Jul 16, 2017, 10:24:32 PM
Daniel A Reynaud - Hi Jim, a beautiful shot, of course, but I'm just a bit surprised by your choice of cropping. Was there a particular reason not to go square on this one ?
Jul 16, 2017, 7:42:47 PM
Jim - You're very welcome, Jim. Nice to hear from you. I'm glad you find my photo tips useful.
Jul 16, 2017, 7:39:31 PM
Jim Steadman - These tips are great! A wonderful idea and much appreciated. Thanks!
Jul 16, 2017, 7:13:19 PM
Jim - Thanks a lot, Debi. Glad you like it.
Jul 16, 2017, 6:24:29 PM
Debi Tepper - Gorgeous, looks like fun!