Crested Hawk Eagle Juvenile with Kill

[Priya Vinay]

Nikon D40|Nikon 70-300|ISO 400|f5.6|1/100s| Aperture Priority
Location: Kabini, Karnataka
October 2009

As said earlier, the lighting was very low and had to shoot up the ISO to catch this raptor having his meal. There was no time to back off to get him in full frame or to choose a good background as he was gobbling his food in top speed.

[Mrudul Godbole]

Nice action captured. Quite difficult conditions to photograph. Liked the pose and the flesh in the beak is a nice bonus. I would prefer some more brighness. Did you try any horizontal compositions?

[Praveen Siddannavar]

Wow! this is a great capture, the image is sharp and i liked the eyes. What did it kill lizard or some other prey?
TFS

[Priya Vinay]

Mrudul: Yes, I do have some horizontal compositions, will be sharing in coming days :)

Praveen: The naturalist Afsar who was with us said it might be a Palm Squirrel, but he was not sure. Will share some more photos where the head of the prey is seen...

Thank you for your comments :)

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Lovely. Most of the times we are satisfied watching this bird looking left or right, that too full frame at 800mm focal length :D And you get it close to your vehicle with a kill. What more can someone expect! Terrific.

If the prey is small, it won't take much of time to finish it. So it is not easy. We have to try to do the best we can. Don't be turned down. However, the difference between good and great images are the details. Long back, during the judging of a wildlife photography contest, I had seen a nice behavioural capture of a kingfisher offering a pebble to its mate got struck down, just because there were out of focus highlights in the foliage. So we keep on discussing these things to grill these into us so that it becomes like involuntary reactions - they way a person raises his foot immediately after placing it on a thorn.

I wish you had better light. I would prefer more space at the bottom and less at the top. Having said that, one should first thank his/her stars for having witnessed such a sight. Photography is always a bonus. Look forward to more of this series.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[Abhishek Jamalabad]

Great capture considering the conditions... The ISO hasn't created much problems.

[Bibhav Behera]

Very nicely done, given the conditions. Do you have any horizontals of it eating?

[Ramesh Anantharaman]

what a lovely moment captured.

the light seems to have been at atotal angle due to which the whites on the wings seem to have some over exposure. but you have handle the situation beautifully and got the main idea of the shot in beautiful exposure.


warm regards

ramesh